QuestionFirst of all, thank you so much for the wonderful information that you offer and for your time and attention to my question.
My car was rearended at a stop sign on May 4th. My three children were not injured, although my daughter who is 11 did complain about her back for several days afterwards, she has since recovered. I was injured and received several x-rays at the hospital as well as follow-up therapy with a chiropractor for eight weeks. Since this is the first time I have been in a car accident I decided to retain an attorney to help with my personal injury claim; however I am having difficulty communicating with my attorney.
I have not once spoken to him directly, the calls that I make are answered by his assistant and when I ask questions they cannot give me concrete answers. I was told by the assistant that they had not received my records from the chiropractor which was not true because the secretary from the chiropractor's office had mailed the information to the office almost one week prior and when I relayed this information to my lawyer's assistant, the records miraculously appeared. Now, the issue is my hospital record which was supposedly requested nearly 2 months ago, now the assistant is claiming that the office hasn't received this. When I called last week, I was told that the hospital was paid $25.00 for each record (for a total of $75.00) and the records would be there Friday. So I called yesterday and the assistant said that the hospital was requesting $22.00 for each record and that the records would be there sometime this week. I was in the area where the hospital is located so I asked if they wanted me to pick up the records and the assistant told me no, because I wouldn't be able to get all the information they needed; which sounded shady to me because it is my record and the hospital would release everything to me. I ended up stopping and getting the records anyway.
At this point, I am not feeling confident in my legal representation because I feel like I am getting the runaround when it comes to my claim. I provided a typed narrative concerning my injuries and pain as well as hospital bills and what care was provided during my emergency room visit almost two months ago but still nothing. I never speak to my lawyer and no one calls me to let me know what is going on. The assistant told me last week that it is not their fault they haven't received my hospital records and that they're doing their best but I don't believe this. I have been released from all medical care for nearly three weeks and it seems as if everything concerning my claim is at a standstill while I am constantly receiving bills from the hospital and chiropractor. I guess, what I need to know is how to proceed with dealing with my lawyer. I don't understand how this whole process works and I feel like I am being left in the dark and my case is not being handled properly.
AnswerDear April,
It is frustrating to hire a personal injury attorney who is not taking care of his files. Attorneys regularly let smaller cases such as your languish on their floor while they have to pursue the bigger cases with ready cash in order to meet the overhead expenses. We are guilty of that, I will confess. I have done it myself. But we should always have ready information to satisfy the client’s legitimate inquiries.
We should tell the client when there are going to be delays in getting back to her. But the client also has to have sufficient patience to let the office function on its own time. When a client is calling a lot about a minor claim, it can become a problem for the office.
Most good personal injury attorneys will make sure that if they cannot answer the client’s calls, they will get back to the client when time permits—maybe in three or four days. But you have to understand that while your accident and your injuries are very important to you, the fees you will pay are not for custom services wherein the attorney and his whole office are going to devote themselves to your claim. That would never happen in a smaller case such as yours, and/or the fees would be a combination of big cash and a high contingency fee to compensate for inordinate devotion of resources to that one client.
There are likely very serious cases in a good personal injury office. I am not defending poor attorney phone manners, since I always made sure to get along with my clients, and I would call them four days later if the assistant was having to go to bat for me too often. But one has to think of how it is to be under fire all the time in handling important cases through depositions, through motions, through mediation, arbitration, settlement conferences, and, finally, through trial.
In all of this I am trying to put your case in perspective to help you see how your frequent calls fit in with the scheme of things. The challenge your attorney is having with you is that he sees that your inquiries are now becoming a nuisance. In addition, you are trying to make light of your claim by demanding an immediate settlement. That plays right into the hands of the adjuster.
In the first place, I NEVER EVER WOULD LET YOU SETTLE YOUR CLAIM SO CLOSE IN TIME TO THE ACCIDENT. If I were your attorney, I would explain that while soft tissue injuries can show as “healed”, they can pop right back up when subjected to physical activity. The scar tissue that heals tiny tears in soft tissue injuries, such as ligamentous damage, does not have the same elasticity as the original, and hence one could be subject to another injury with less trauma than at first.
Here you are facing a full summer of participating in outdoor activities, and it is LIKELY THAT LATER ON YOU WILL EXPERIENCE SOME GENERAL ACHE AT NIGHT OR THE NEXT DAY FOLLOWING PHYSICAL STRESS ON YOUR NEWLY-HEALED BODY.
If you settle now, who is going to pay for those costs of treatment and who is going to compensate you for your pain and suffering?
As for the communications from the attorney himself, we use our assistants just as the doctor uses her nurses. Call your doctor and ask any question and chances are very high that unless it is a significant issue, the return information will be given by the nurse. Why is that OK for them, but not for attorneys?
In the types of questions you are raising, the attorney cannot afford to speak with you and to hand-hold you through this process. That is reserved for clients who have difficult cases in terms of liability or significant injuries. And there is plenty of work to be done in aid of those who really need his time and attention. We hope that you are never going to have a big injury so that you are one of those, but if it ever happened, .you would appreciate all of the time and assistance your attorney will give to you then. Hence, please do not condemn your attorney for using his assistant.
And let him do his job without checking up on him and phoning him about his progress. Here you are just two and a half months post accident and you expect to have a demand letter out?? That is an adjuster’s dream: “Let’s take the little treatment costs to date and make a neat little settlement before she has to return for care.”
I am not suggesting that you wait just so the attorney can move your file from his floor to his desk, and I am not saying your doctor was wrong to release you. But I would just give it another couple of weeks or a month to make sure that you do not have what almost all of us with soft tissue injuries experience: a reoccurrence of symptoms with exposure to physical activities. It happens more often than not that our clients have to live with some periodic pains after they have settled.
Have patience, and Best Wishes,
Dr. Settlement, J.D. (Juris Doctor)
Http://www.SettlementCentral.Com
