I Was Hit And Injured By An Uninsured Motorist In Broward County… Can I Still Recover Financially?

Key Takeaways

• One of the most important insurances to get is uninsured motorist coverage.
• The insurance adjuster’s sole job is to contact you right after the accident to get you to accept a lower settlement.
• Even if the other driver’s insurance company writes you a check soon after the accident, hire an experienced insurance claim attorney to evaluate the offer.

In Florida, there are a lot of uninsured or underinsured drivers on the road: people with no insurance, people with minimal insurance, and people with no bodily injury liability insurance.

To avoid this situation, one of the insurance coverages that is important in Florida is underinsured or uninsured motorist coverage, known as UM. The benefit of uninsured motorist coverage is if you’re involved in an accident and it’s the other person’s fault, they hit and ran, they don’t have insurance, or they don’t have enough insurance, your insurance company has agreed to cover the claim as if they were insured by your own insurance company.

For example, if you have uninsured motorist coverage of $100,000 per person, $300,000 per occurrence, your insurance company acts as the insurance company for the hit-and-run driver, the driver that didn’t have enough insurance, or the right kind of insurance, up to the $100,000 per person, $300,000 per occurrence.

Uninsured insurance is the most important insurance that I recommend people to get because after the accident, it’s too late for you to buy the UM insurance to cover you for that accident.

Now, if you’re involved in an accident with someone who doesn’t have enough insurance or the right kind of insurance and you don’t have uninsured motorist coverage, you still have rights. Your rights aren’t determined by whether someone has insurance or how much insurance they have. Your rights are determined by who’s at fault in the accident, and who is negligent. If someone is negligent, they’re responsible. The difference is, if they have insurance, then you’re able to collect to the extent of the insurance coverages, you’re able to collect for their negligence. If they don’t have insurance, it doesn’t mean you don’t have a claim, it just means it might be significantly more difficult to collect on it.

Do I Still Need To Hire An Auto Accident Injury Attorney In Florida Even If Liability In My Car Wreck Is Clear?

I recommend hiring an accident injury lawyer. For instance, we have found that an insurance company adjuster’s sole purpose is to contact people right after the accident and try to settle their injury claims for less than what they should. We had a recent situation where somebody hired us… They insisted they hadn’t signed any paper, but they received an offer from the insurance company. We found out the insurance company had a signed release for $600 in change on a claim that would have been worth policy limits. Whenever someone is making you an offer, particularly early on, you have to question whether or not it’s really in your best interest to accept it and has such an offer been evaluated by an attorney?

When you call our office at (866) 824-4222, Your Injury Law Group, the call is free, but the advice may be priceless.

You can call us and we’ll evaluate the offer. If the offer is good, we’re going to tell you that’s a good offer. Considering the situation, we will go over the factors that you should be considering, and you can make an informed decision about whether the offer is in your best interest or not. If it is, you don’t have to pay an attorney’s fee. More often than not, what you’ll find is the initial insurance company’s offer is incredibly low. There are some big-name insurance companies and this is what they do.

It’s not that you have to hire an attorney. It’s that you should get advice from an experienced personal injury attorney, someone who has seen the situation before and can evaluate the offer. I’ve had clients that waited to contact us after the accident for even a short period of time. The other driver’s insurance company contacted them right away saying something like, “We’ve got money for you.” I’ve never seen an insurance company make an initial offer where I would have recommended it. Every single time the amount of money is something we could have easily doubled, tripled, or even quadrupled.

If an insurance company came in with a $10,000 policy and they are offering the $10,000 policy limit, you don’t need an attorney. But if they’re offering $1,000 on that $10,000 policy limit or less, my recommendation is to hire an attorney to evaluate the offer.

For more information on Uninsured & Underinsured Motorists in Florida, a free initial consultation is your next best step. Get the information and legal answers you are seeking by calling (866) 824-4222 today.