How to deal with claims adjuster?

I misspoke earlier: It's her lower back, which started hurting a few hours after the accident and is still bothering her today. It may not be lawsuit worthy. I don't know. I wouldn't expect them to back down. It's basically about justice in my mind and if it turns into something chronic, I think the trucking company (it is national I believe) should be footing the bill. I don't want to be paying for this out of my pocket 2 years from now.

I have a good friend (she's like a second mother to me) who works as an assistant to an attorney where I live who does personal injury stuff. They're not on the back of the phone book or billboards! I have sent her a detailed email with those pictures I posted asking her thoughts on the situation. I guess emotional duress caused to our son and the wife and I aren't something to sue over?

I'll mention the back pain when/if the claims adjuster calls tomorrow and see what he says.

The big thing immediately, I guess, is getting our van fixed right and hopefully getting some money for diminished value. And I expect the claims guy will want to do that expeditiously since we're in a rental minivan that's costing them about $36 a day. So it all comes down to whether the claims guy puts up a fight on the things I want and should have coming to me as to how quickly the van part of this equation gets resolved.

Thanks again for all the feedback. I've been around since the Mike Piazza gay rumors in 2001 I guess, but most of my posts are for stuff like this. The last time I posted anything of significance was when the Whole Foods manager tried to take Trader Joe's balloons from my kids! We cleaned house in that situation because I was persistent (Care package full of goodies for the kids, $50 gift card, letter of apology from the manager!). I won't be bullied by a claims guy. But I just need to know what to be asking for and knowing that I have a "right" to OEM parts etc. so that I don't get bullied. Again, all the comments have been very nice and helpful.

 

Sorry to piggyback on this thread, but I have a similar question.

My wife was driving in a parking lot yesterday. Someone backed out and hit the passenger side door of our car, putting a rather large dent in it. We have an appointment for an estimate at a body shop our insurance company sent us to.

If we choose to get it fixed elsewhere, what if the other place charges more for the repairs than the insurance company-recommended place? Do we have to pay the difference?

Also, our insurance company has offered to pay for a rental car, but they only pay $15/day, which is less than half of what a rental would cost. Will we get reimbursed the full cost of a rental car by the other person's insurance, as they seem to be the one at fault in the accident.

 

Actually, most car rental places offer a rate for collision work.

 

I'm getting an "insurance rate" on the minivan we have because I told the rental car place our situation and that an insurance company would be eventually paying the bill. They just have a hold for several hundred dollars on my Amex for the time being so we had something to drive away in. But the insurance rate on a van is still $36/day. For a sedan, it can't me much less ... $25 or $30 ... certainly not $15 a day.

It doesn't surprise me that they're pulling that $15 a day shit. But my insurance lady told me that with two kids, they should give us something comparable ... at the very least a sedan. So this is probably your first battle of many to come with an adversarial insurance company. They want to give you $15 a day ... you may be like me and have two kids or whatever ... or you might have been driving a Honda Accord or whatever and $15 a day is going to get you (insert shit car ... 1992 Ford Tempo). I stand with what I was told: Get something comparable to what you were driving when their customer hit you and make them pay every fucking cent.

 

First, I advise you against taking a check for a high estimate, then going to the low estimate place. Don't try to make money on the repair. The low-ball place will probably end up costing as much in the end anyway.

If you have a good relationship with your insurance company, let them handle the repair. You can take it where you want and you should specify original parts.

If your wife's in pain at all, call a lawyer. Your friend's boss would probably be best. I wouldn't even bring it up to the other company's adjuster. That's when they'll start screwing around with you.

Insurance companies suck. They will use any method they can to hold up paying your claim even by one day. Don't give an inch to those bastards.

 

unless your state has some strange laws it would take a miracle to get damages for infliction of emotional distress for a simple auto accident like this. i know it's not simple in your mind but those kinds of damages are usually reserved for horrific situations. that said, if the injury become chronic, then you can get damages for things like lost support and services and loss of consortium. the former is basically for the fact that your wife can no longer do wife-ly things - cook, clean, drive junior to soccer, etc. - and the latter is for loss of sex.

 

As others have stated: Go through your insurance company. First off, your repairs will be taken care of MUCH quicker. Secondly, your insurance company will fight the other company to get its money (and your deductible) back.

 

That the best advise. Let your insurance company handle it for you on your behalf. The term is subrugate. That is what you need to tell your insurance company - that you want to subragate the claiim . They will remburse you for repairs less deductable then go after the money from the trucking companies insurer. When they are paid you will get your deductable. In meantime you can get on with your life. They key here is that knowledge is power. get as informed as possible and don't be in any rush to settle. Insurance companies know that they longer it takes to settle the greater the payout so they push for settlement.

Those were some pictures. Glad you and your family were relitively uninjiured.

 

One thing I would do is NOT settle with the insurance company any injuries for at least six months. Wait and see how everyone feels physically. A lot of times, people feel fine right away, and then they start feeling sore and find out they're really hurt. If there are injuries, then get a (good) lawyer and sue. It'll take a couple of years, during which hopefully the injuries will heal, but that will buy you some more time to make sure you and the family are O.K. and you'll probably get more money than if you go without a lawyer.

I'll give you a couple quick examples: Years ago, I took one of those defensive driving classes. The instructor told us that if we were ever in an accident to go to the hospital to get ourselves checked out physically, even if we were feeling fine. He told us of a man who felt fine and was walking around right after the accident and then died the next day of internal injuries.

That man was the instructor's son.

Also, not to get too specific because I don't want to out myself, but I know of a person who had their car bumped. The hospital figured it was whiplash, but the person ended up with herniated discs. They got a nice settlement from the insurance company after a couple of years, but are still dealing with disc problems.

I'm glad that everyone is relatively O.K. But, and not to sound like one of those lawyers on TV, don't be too quick to settle with the insurance company over the medical portion of your case. Someone might be hurt worse than you think.

 

Thanks for all the advice. I was about to post an update and read Baron's post, which is more good information. Leo, thanks again for giving free legal advice. It's nice to be able to come here and get help from such good, educated people.

Here's the update. Any other thoughts/advice would be greatly appreciated.

My wife was having more back pains today, so she went to the doctor. It's her upper back, which the doctor said was probably strained muscles. The doctor didn't think there was disc damage etc. They gave my wife some muscle relaxers and some pain medicine and told her to not doing any heavy lifting for about two weeks and see if the pain went away. The next step would be an X-Ray and then an MRI if it didn't improve, but the doctor seemed to think it would heal. My wife was folding laundry today and it was hurting her enough that she called me and said it was time to go see a doctor. We paid for that visit out of pocket. I called our insurance company because we had a medical rider on our insurance and I guess they're supposed to pay for that no matter who's at fault. So we'll be reimbursed by one of the insurance companies I'm sure.

I also called the Georgia Insurance Commissioner's office and spoke to someone in consumer affairs. The guy was a jerk and Georgia has really crummy laws to protect people like us. The police report doesn't determine fault, the insurance companies do? We are not entitled to new car seats by law (it says they're only good for one accident on the car seat tag!), not entitled to new seat belts (an uncle said those are good for only one accident as well), not entitled to original Honda parts, not entitled to a similar vehicle at the insurer's expense. Sounds very friendly to the insurance companies. Shocking, I know. I've always hated John Oxendine, our insurance commissioner.

The trucker's insurer never called me today as I was told, so I guess I'm going to call them tomorrow morning. We need to get our van in a body shop and get this rental car on the trucker's insurance company and off my credit card. I'll just call, tell them what happened and asked what we need to do. Just play dumb and see where it goes? I, of course, want all of the things the insurance commissioner's office says I'm not entitled to and will be battling for them. But I'll start out nice! A lot of people here have given the great advice to file through my insurance company and let them duke it out with the trucker's insurer. We may end up doing that if there's enough stalling, but we REALLY don't have the $500 deductible to pay out of pocket right now, even given that we would be reimbursed later. So that's the only thing stopping me from doing that.

On the injury: my sister said she was in an accident where she wasn't at fault and had to see a chiropractor. She told the other person's insurer about the chiropractor and they offered her $1,000 to sign a waiver. I guess I'll mention my wife's doctor's visit to the insurance company tomorrow and see if I get a similar offer. But with Baron's new comments this afternoon, maybe I don't take the money now? The point is valid. I'm no spring chicken now at 35. I may end up with back pains in the next week or whenever and taking $1,000 from them tomorrow would I guess absolve them of paying for that and/or if my wife ends up needing X-Rays etc. ?

 

check with the insurance company about new car seats. Even though it isn't the state law, they might give you that or reimburse you.

I live in California and when we had an accident, my insurance company expressly directed me to get a new car seat for my child and said they would reimburse me, which they did.

 

When I was in an accident a couple years ago, I had my insurance company telling me to pay the deductible and let them handle it, but, like you, I did not have $500, and I could not make them understand that. Eventually everything was handled through the other guy's insurance company fairly quickly.

IIRC, the AJC did a series a couple years ago that basically explained that Georgia is just about the friendliest (to insurance companies) state in the Union as far as regulations are concerned.

And I haven't seen this mentioned anywhere else, but if they really give you a hard time, why not mention that you work for a newspaper? They don't have to know that you really can't write an article about how shitty they are.