After working for an insurance company for over 13 years as a defense lawyer, I opened my own practice, this time representing victims of car accidents.
One of the biggest questions I get all the time is this: “I’ve been involved in a car accident. What should I be doing?” Here is a list of things to do after an auto accident. 1) If you are still at the scene of the accident, and if you believe that you’ve been injured (even in the slightest), insist on obtaining a police report. There are several reasons to ask for a police report from the investigating officer. First, it documents the event, making it less likely the other party will change their story later on. Second, a police report documents your injury (the officer will usually as if you are hurt. You must tell them if you are so they can document your injury in their report) which lends credibility to a subsequent injury claim. In my experience, when there is no police report, the other party changes their story in some way, sometimes drastically, about 50% of the time. If there are any witnesses who favor your version of the events, try to get their contact information. 2) Make sure you act quickly in getting medical attention for your injuries. Not only is it the smart thing to do for your health, but delays in treatment will be used against you by most insurance adjusters. They generally argue that delays in treatment are evidence that the injury wasn’t serious. In other words, if you had serious or appreciable injuries, you would have sought treatment. Therefore, by not getting treatment, you must not be injured! 3) Make sure you take extensive photographs of all vehicle damage, not only photos of your vehicle but also of the other vehicles involved in the accident. These days, most people have phones that are capable of taking photos. Therefore, you might even be able to take photos at the scene of the accident. Also, don’t just take one photos. Taking many photos of your car from several angles and distances will help document the extent of damage to your vehicle. Also, while your vehicle may not look so bad, the other vehicle might have extensive damage. A picture tells a thousand words. Describing the damage to your vehicle simply doesn’t have the same effect as showing someone. Remember, if you make a claim in the future, the insurance adjuster is going to make every effort to minimize your claim. Photos of extensive damage can help persuade an adjuster otherwise. 4) Take photos of any and all injuries you may have sustained (even if it is slight bruising, cuts or scrapes). Take them in different lighting situations and from different angles. Sometimes injuries don’t show up well in photographs, so you want to make sure the injury photos are decent. 5) Gather all insurance information, not only regarding the person who caused the accident, but also your policy. Get the other person’s policy number, insurance company, and vehicle information. Make sure you also get their address. Also, get your insurance information and a copy of your “Declarations Page” which has a summary of the coverage you have available. There is a 25% the party at fault either didn’t have insurance or didn’t have enough insurance. In that case, you want to make sure you have Uninsured Motorist Coverage (UM Coverage). 6) Get a property damage estimate. An estimate will usually reveal all the parts of the care that were damages. Sometimes there can be extensive damage that isn’t easily visible, especially frame damage. When there isn’t a lot of cosmetic damage to a vehicle, a showing of frame damage can help persuade an insurance adjuster that an impact was relatively significant. 7) If you get treatment from any medical providers, mention every single thing that bothers you from the accident, even if it doesn’t bother you much anymore. Keep in mind insurance companies are using software to analyze your case. If something isn’t documented in your medical records (including any and all complaints), then it simply won’t be inputted into the computer by the insurance adjuster. Remember, if something isn’t in your medical records, it’s like it never happened. I tell clients to pretend the insurance adjuster is sitting on their shoulder like a parakeet during their doctor visits and therefore they need to be very aware of what they tell their health care providers. Don't give recorded statements to insurance adjusters until you've spoken with a personal injury attorney. Make sure you know all your rights. A good personal injury lawyer can also educate you about your options. For example, while you might think you have a great case, the attorney may think differently. Also, in some cases, a good lawyer might explain that you are better off without an attorney’s help. A good lawyer will also tell you of strengths and weaknesses in your case. An initial consultation is usually free of charge. Call (661) 414-7100 to see if we can help with your case. VIDEO TRANSCRIPT:
Hello everyone, today I want to talk to you about hospital bills and hospital bills that you incur after a car accident. My name is Robert Mansour, and I'm a personal injury lawyer in the Los Angeles area. When you get hospital bills from a personal injury accident where somebody caused harm to you and you got a serious accident, you went to the hospital, you're going to get some bills in the mail. Now, you can't ignore hospital bills. By the way, it's never just hospital bills. It's usually hospital bills. It's usually hospital bills, the emergency room physicians, the imaging center that took x-ray and CT scans of you, etc. It's also the ambulance bill. You're going to start to get several bills from a lot of different facilities and providers. ...Anesthesiologists, for example. You get all these things in the mail and the temptation might be, "Oh, I don't have to pay this. The responsible party's got to pay it, I don't have to pay it." Yes, the responsible party is responsible for those bills, but they're not going to pay it. It is your responsibility to pay the hospital bills and emergency room bills and the ambulance bill. You might say, "Well, I have health insurance for that." Well, you're still responsible for the co-pays, the deductibles, and all of that. Just because the other party may have admitted fault for the accident still does not absolve you of the responsibility for paying for those bills. So, how do you pay for those bills? Well, there's many different options. Number one, if you have health insurance, use that. Have your health insurance pay the hospital bills and the emergency room and the ambulance, etc. Keep in mind that you might have co-pays and co-insurance amounts that you have to pay, and deductibles that you have to meet. Then, keep in mind, that your health insurance company that just paid for all those bills, they have a right to reimbursement for what they paid out in many cases. You have to be very careful not to settle with the responsible party before you figure out whether or not you have to repay your health insurance company. You also might be able to pay out of your own pocket, so if you don't have health insurance, you can just tell the hospital, "Hey listen, I don't have health insurance, can you treat me as a 'cash' patient?" A lot of providers will give you a discount if you are paying as a cash patient. Sometimes actually it's less than if you went through your own health insurance. Cash patient you pay out of your own pocket and you keep track of all that. Finally, some people have something called medical payments coverage. Medical payments coverage is something available under your own auto insurance policy in many cases. In fact, you might have it and not even know it. That basically means that you have health insurance, kind of health insurance, under your automobile policy. How much do you have? You have to check. You can't just assume. Most people have two thousand dollars or five thousand dollars, in some cases, I've seen even more than that. Now, you auto insurance company will then pay for your health care bills and your hospital bills, etc. Keep in mind that your auto insurance company, just like your health insurance, has a right to reimbursement if you recover money from the responsible party. Ultimately, you will claim all of these things when you bring a claim against the responsible party and their insurance company. The fundamental point for you to understand is that you are responsible for those bills. The hospital has provided a service to you and they expect to be paid. You can't tell them, "Oh, don't bother me - you guys go after the guy who hit me." That's not going to work. Please understand when you get bills in the mail, you get things in the mail from the hospital, from the ambulance, from the emergency room doctors, etc, you can't ignore those bills. You must make sure they get paid or you might be sent to collections or you could be ultimately sued to collect those amounts, so be very very careful and understand that that is your responsibility. Thank you very much for watching this video. I hope you found it helpful. My name is Robert Mansour, if I can be of further assistance, please feel free to contact my office. Thank you very much. |
Attorney Robert MansourRobert Mansour is an attorney in Santa Clarita, California who has been practicing law since 1993. After working for 13 years for the insurance companies, he now counsels victims of personal injury. Click here to learn more about Robert Mansour. Categories
All
Archives
December 2024
|