Auto Insurance Claims: PIP coordinating with Short Term disability, insurance expert, PIP

Question
I live in Utah. I was involved in an auto accident which involved personal injuries. I have already been off a month from work and have a 60% short term disability policy. How if at all does short term disability work with the loss of earnings benefit on the auto policy?

Answer
Hello Maurine,

Understand that I do not have access to your PIP policy or your disability policy, so I can only answer in a general sense. You will need to refer to both policies for specific details.

That being said, ordinarily in the case of a traffic accident the auto benefits (in this case PIP) will be primary over the disability coverage.  What that means is that PIP benefits would have to exhaust before the disability would kick in.  But since PIP would also cover your actual medical expenses, it is safe to assume that the benefits would exhaust on those expenses, leaving the balance (if there is one) to be used for disability.

The point is, most PIP does not have adequate benefits to pay for both medical expenses and disability - at least not for a serious injury or over a period of time.  In that case, you would have to file a claim with the disability policy.

I suggest you refer specifically to your policies and also contact your employer's HR department for further information.

Good luck

Jane Pytel

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