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One of the top reasons you need a car accident lawyer is to help you deal with insurance companies. They attempt to minimize or dismiss your claim to save money. If you have serious injuries, having your claim reduced or denied is a setback.
Other good reasons to hire an attorney include:
Yes, you are required to report your car accident to your insurance company. This is not because of any “state” law, but your insurance contract with your vehicle insurer requires that you report a car accident very soon after the collision.
The reason for that is if the company is made aware of the accident, the sooner it can attempt to investigate or defend a claim. If you do not report the crash within a reasonable amount of time, your insurer may deny coverage. A reasonable amount of time may be a little as one or two days after the accident. It depends on the circumstances. For instance if you were seriously injured and hospitalized, it may take you some time to let the insurance company know about the crash and the outcome.
Even if your accident only resulted in minor injuries and very little damage to your vehicle and you do not think it is a reportable accident, it is best to still let your vehicle insurance company know to ensure your carrier provides coverage for the accident if you “do” need it later. Additionally, you need to connect with your insurance agent if you believe the other driver was at-fault for the collision and that you want to pursue an insurance claim. This is a wise course of action, as there may be benefits available to you via your own policy that you may need to access.
Just because you feel the other driver was the one who caused the accident, it does not mean that individual’s insurance company is going to agree. Remember, you need an insurance company to provide the authority for repairs to your vehicle. If they are disputing fault, they may not want to agree to the repairs. You might need to rent a vehicle. Both those scenarios may possibly involve your own insurance company paying for repairs and a rental vehicle. However, that can only happen if they are aware of the accident, so reporting it no matter how big or small is the best course of action.
The other situation where it becomes crucial to have reported the accident is in a situation where the other driver does not have “any” car insurance. In a case like that, you may be able to access compensation from you uninsured motorist coverage.
The other very important reason to alert you car insurance company is if you sustained injuries, no matter how minor you may think they are. Injuries sustained in a car accident often turn into more serious ones over time and if you do not let your insurance company know you were hurt, you may not be able to invoke your insurance coverage and you may not receive reimbursement for any medical, therapeutic or ER costs.
When in doubt, call your insurance agent.
An accident attorney cannot provide an exact value for the accident you were involved in. This is because, damages are determined upon multiple factors like, who is deemed liable for the crash, and what percentage they may have been at-fault, what insurance policies are on the settlement table and what the damages are. Car accident lawyers usually work with various experts to carefully evaluate the maximum amount of compensation that may be available in your claim, as no two accidents are ever alike in outcome.
You may be eligible to recover a variety of damages, but you are not likely to get a good idea of what kinds of damages and what they may be worth without speaking to an experienced car accident lawyer. Generally speaking, you could recover compensation for costs of medical care, reduced earning capacity, scarring, pain, mental anguish and physical impairment.
Your car accident attorney assesses the value of your damages and then builds a case for you to obtain a fair and full settlement. You should be aware that Texas is a shared fault state and the amount of compensation you may receive depends on the percentage of fault attributed to you in causing the accident. If the other party is over 51 percent responsible, your quest for compensation is likely to succeed.
In this highly technological age, you can use your cellphone or another device to record videos and pictures. You can even take a short video of a witness saying what they saw and providing their contact information. I have found that once witnesses leave the scene, they are less likely to want to get involved in any claim, so getting them to state what they saw while still at the scene can be critical.
Pictures are truly valuable in a car accident case. Get as many as you can of all the vehicles involved in the crash, where they ended up, the site of the collision, skidmarks, road debris, traffic signs, and signals. You might even take pictures of your injuries and those of others if you had passengers in your vehicle at the time of the accident. It’s important to do this if you can, as once you have left the crash site, it gets cleaned up and evidence is lost.
Just remember that if you are seriously hurt, there may be some limitations on what you can do. If you can still take pictures or videos, do so. If you have a dashcam onboard or some other device that was operating at the time of the crash, make sure the police know about it and that your car accident attorney sees it as soon as possible.
If you are badly hurt, you need to be taken to the hospital. When there, take pictures of your injuries before and after treatment. Also, keep a record of what was said and what you need to do to recover. You can use your phone for this as well. The most important thing to remember though is that you need to see a doctor and be assessed no matter if you do not have serious injuries or not.
Various injuries can go undetected until they start to manifest themselves, such as whiplash, concussions, brain injuries, and internal organ damage. If you do not see a doctor after being in a crash, the insurance company is going to give you a hard time and suggest your injuries were not all that bad, that your injuries happened after the accident, or that you had pre-existing injuries.
The point of the insurance company giving you a rough time about your car accident claim has to do with them wanting to protect the insurance company’s financial bottom line. They want to pay you as little as they can for your claim. This is why you want solid information, pictures, videos, medical assessment and treatment, and a skilled car accident attorney.
All adults and children, driver and passengers, must wear seat belts. If the children are under the age of 8 (unless they are taller than 4 foot, 9 inches), they must be in a child passenger safety seat system. Children 8 years of age and older must wear a safety belt.
In a negligence suit, a plaintiff must prove that the other party owed a duty to the claimant and that the other party violated or breached that duty. In your question, drivers owe a duty to one another to drive safely. In Texas, a plaintiff must prove that the defendant breached that duty by either (1) taking an action that a reasonably prudent driver would not have taken; or (2) failing to take an action that a reasonably prudent driver would have taken. For example, you could prove that the driver engaged in affirmative conduct by texting and driving that a reasonably prudent driver would not do. Alternatively, a driver may be negligence for failing to swerve when an ordinary safe driver would have swerved.
Proving the defendant breached a duty is necessary to for the plaintiff to recover on the plaintiff’s claims.
An accident can happen to anyone. Nationwide, millions are injured in car wrecks and in Texas. In 2019 there were 19,506 serious crashes in Texas, with 30,992 people seriously injured. There were 3,722 deaths.
You may have serious injuries after a crash, and if you have passengers, they may be hurt badly or possibly dead. You need to try and accomplish some steps to protect yourself and your legal rights while you are at the scene of the crash.
Steps to follow after a crash
To protect your legal rights after you have been involved in a Texas car crash remember these three tips:
The main causes of collisions are typically external factors, such as poor roads and/or weather and driver error.
Driver error may involve:
No matter what the reason is for an accident, if you have been involved in one, you need to seek medical attention as soon as possible. Even if you feel you only have a minor injury, it may turn into something more later and if you do not have a medical record of it, it can bar you from recovering later. A doctor needs to diagnose any injuries and you need to start getting medical care and have a paper trail that can prove it, should it be necessary.
Many people ask after an accident whether or not they really need an attorney and the answer is, yes, it is to protect “your” legal interests. One of the main reasons for hiring a car accident lawyer is that the insurance company you are dealing with may not be protecting your interests. Instead, they are trying to protect “their” interests and bottom line by doing what they can to minimize or deny your claim. When you have legal representation, insurance companies tend to make more reasonable offers when it comes to settling claims.
Being involved in a crash is overwhelming and you may wish to seek compensation to pay your medical and other expenses. Finding a personal injury attorney to represent you is the best decision you could make in order to get that compensation.
If you have been injured, you need time to recover. You are likely to lose wages and may not know how long it is going to take to recover. You may develop post-traumatic stress disorder and discover you are going to need on-going physical therapy to get your life back on track. You do not need to be fighting with an insurance company to have your bills paid. This is a lawyer’s job.
After an accident, insurance adjusters start calling to pressure you to sign a release, make a statement or to settle up fast. Do not speak to an insurance adjuster without discussing it with your attorney.
If you have been involved in an accident, call Schuelke Law for help recovering lost wages, medical bills and compensation for pain and suffering. We can handle any negotiations and going to court if necessary.
Yes, you can and should talk to them if you can do so. Find out what they saw, and get all of their contact information. Do not, under any circumstances, talk to them about what you think happened in the wreck or what caused the wreck. You may say something while you’re in a state of shock, and what you say can be used against you by an insurance company or the other party’s lawyer to limit your rights to compensation or the amount you can collect.
Claims that arise from being in a crash are referred to as personal injury claims – claims that happen when someone is hurt as a result of the negligence of another person or persons, or entity. Two types of claims may be filed in a vehicle accident, a personal injury claim to seek compensation for injuries and property damage, and a wrongful death claim if someone died. A personal injury attorney handles both types of cases.
While you may not be sure if you have a claim, the one way to find out if you do is to contact a personal injury lawyer and have your possible claim evaluated. There are multiple factors to take into consideration, including:
I often get asked how much a claim is worth. There is no set-in-stone answer to that, as in each case, the injuries, circumstances, and so forth are what dictate what a case may be worth. That said, although we cannot give you a solid figure, we can provide you with an estimate. That estimate may include: