When you’ve been through a vehicular accident (or some other kind of accident that causes a personal injury) you deserve time to recover. Hopefully, you weren’t that injured. Maybe a day or two at home and you’re ready to go right back to work; or better still, you head straight back to work the very next day. Unfortunately, that’s not always the case. Sometimes, these injuries can linger. You deserve compensation. In this blog, an LA personal injury attorney from our firm will discuss some ways that the LA Injury Group can help your case as well as how you can help yourself, too.
For those who’ve suffered an injury that leads to a lengthy rehab, it’s natural to feel as if you’re completely out of sorts. One day, you’re fine, and your life is going how you would expect – and the next day, you’re facing challenges and hardships that you couldn’t have seen coming. Even with a support network, even with the love of those closest to you, it can be difficult. This should be a time of healing when you can focus on what’s most important.
Unfortunately, that’s typically when the insurance company will do everything they can to get you to take less money. For the most part, they try to get to people who’ve been through an accident earlier. This makes a cold, Machiavellian sense if you think about it: when a person is wounded and recovering, they may not be as sound of mind and body as they would be later on. That way, the insurance company can lock in a positive result for them (and a negative result for you) when they have the most advantages.
Injury lawyers always say never to sign something from the insurance company until you let attorneys look at it first. There are so many different reasons for this; it could be its own chain of blogs. Attorneys put together these blogs. The high powered attorneys of the insurance company, no doubt some of the best attorneys that can be bought designed these documents. They’re liable to be packed with dense legalese that with so many words and terms, it could make your head spin.
However, all that legalese, all those terms add up to one thing: making sure that you get less than you deserve for your injuries. At the end of the day, that’s what the insurance company is hopping on and working towards. As they have their best attorneys putting together the deal, you deserve to have attorneys on your side, too. That way, it’s at least a fair fight. Instead of you trying to parse these documents yourself, you deserve to have a pro on your side advising you.
For example, say that you suffered an injury to your neck in a vehicular accident. It wasn't your fault; you deserve compensation. Unfortunately, you will have a lengthy hospital stay. You have plenty of time, but you have to spend it in bed mostly. The insurance company makes you an offer and sends you something to look over and sign. Perhaps you’re reticent about hiring a personal injury lawyer, so you decide to handle it yourself.
Now, the most premier legal minds that can be hired by an international insurance company drafted this document. It is not easy reading. You, in all likelihood, do not have any legal training. You’re no doubt very good at your job, and you’re a hard worker, so you’re going to read this thing. But you’re still in a hospital bed. You can get tired at odd times, or it may not always be easy for you to read. Maybe you’re still on some kind of medication as per your doctor’s instructions. In this scenario, you’ve given all your power and leverage to the insurance company.
The LA Injury Group was built for the above situation. If the person had hired us, we could look over the document for them. Instead of them trying to decipher all that legal jargon, we could explain to them in simple, clear terms. Then, we could advise this person on how to proceed. After that, we could implement everything that should be done. All while we’re doing this, that person doesn’t have to worry about reading the document – instead, they can just relax, rest up, and ultimately heal faster and more completely.
You owe it to yourself as well as those who care about you to have a professional lawyer look over anything from the insurance company. Many people, having been injured, will have to deal with insurance adjusters for the first time. This can be a bit disarming, and there’s no way set way to prepare for it. Insurance adjusters almost always come off like the friendliest people in the world. Moreover, they come to you at a time when you might be seriously looking for a friend, so it’s natural to like them the moment they arrive. You can “hit it off” with them easily. However, (and this cannot be stressed enough) always remember why they’re talking to you: to further the aims of the insurance company.
The phrase “insurance adjuster” is a bit misleading and incomplete. Think about it as “insurance attorney emissary” or “trained negotiator.” If you keep that in mind, you always know exactly who it is you’re talking to. This way, you’re less likely to get lost in “this person is my friend” instead of “this person is trying to help the insurance company make money off of me.” If you can keep that in the forefront of your brain while you talk to them, you should be OK.
The goal of an insurance company adjuster is to make you say something that can make your case weaker. They want you to say something about your injury not being that bad. Or that you had an injury in the past that may have caused the pain. Again, this probably won’t take the form of a police interrogation or something like that – it could just be idle compensation.
For example, maybe they’ll bring up playing sports in high school. Perhaps the adjuster will talk about a game they played where they hurt their shoulder quite badly. Then they'll ask if something like that happened to you. If you mention that it did, they can use this against you later on. To be clear, it may have absolutely nothing to do with the injury you suffered in your vehicular accident. IIn fact, there’s practically no chance that it did. But even just that little insinuation may be enough for the insurance adjuster to get you to take less money. That’s how quickly it can work. You can think you’re just making conversation, but what’s happening is that they’re taking your compensation.
Don’t let it happen. When the insurance company starts coming to you, reach out to our law firm. We can take the lead so that you don’t have to deal with the insurance companies. Instead, we’ll handle all of the correspondence with them. That way, you can focus on your recovery and the important people in your life. Start the process today. All you have to do to begin is give us a call at (818) 240-1800. We’ll schedule a free consultation with you.