In previous articles we’ve talked about what a personal injury attorney does with your North Carolina injury claim. In short, it’s a lot, but mostly it can be summarized as investigating coverage and making sure you’re doing what you’re supposed to do and not doing what you’re not supposed to be doing, as well as making sure we get all the documentation we need to negotiate a settlement of your claim.

I can’t speak for everyone, but I almost always try to get a case settled before I file suit. There are exceptions to every rule, but I generally think it’s in most parties’ interests to settle a case without litigation. I’ll do everything I can to get you treated fairly, but that can look different with different facts. It’s trite, but true: Every case is different.

The negotiations process with the insurance adjuster (that’s almost always with whom we’re dealing) can take anywhere from a day to forever. People always want to know how long it will take so they get frustrated when I tell them I can’t tell them, but I can’t. I recently had an adjuster who had a literal 24 hour turn-around on demands, which is unheard of. But I also deal with companies (AAAACH-statefarm-OOOOO!) that don’t respond for months. Of course, we can always file suit, but that doesn’t speed things up; it actually makes them go more slowly AND it costs money, to boot, so that doesn’t help. It normally pays to be patient, so bear with the process.

Most of the time cases do get settled this way. As I wrote above, that’s generally good for everyone, though not always. Assuming it works out, we get the settlement done in writing through a release document and we get your settlement funds. Those funds HAVE to go through my trust account, no ifs ands or buts. That normally takes about a week to clear. Then I have to meticulously document what comes out of those funds (generally my fee, some medical expenses, your take-home) but if you’re working with me, you’ll know what those numbers are before it all goes down.

Here’s what’s crazy: I’ve written 4 articles on what personal injury attorneys do and we haven’t even TOUCHED on litigation yet. That’s explained by two facts: First, we do A LOT for our clients, and Second, most cases get settled without litigation.

Stay tuned for more lawyer stuff.

As you might expect, I get all kinds of calls every day. I often get calls about tickets where the potential client says they are charged with “Driving without a license.” That’s a big red flag for me because often what they’re saying isn’t precisely what they mean.

There IS a criminal charge of driving without your driver’s license on you. That’s generally called a “No Operator’s License” ticket, which we shorten to an NOL. It’s not a huge deal and if you bring your valid license to court, it will almost certainly get dismissed. I don’t mind these at all.

There is ALSO a criminal charge for driving while your license is suspended/revoked. This is generally called “Driving While License Revoked” or DWLR. This is a MUCH bigger deal and can, under the wrong circumstances, actually lead to jail time (rare but possible). It’s also generally indicative of a much bigger issue, in that what revoked your license in the first place might be a simple thing to fix, or it might be terribly complicated, but to deal with the current DWLR charge in the best way possible, you should try to fix the underlying revocation if you can. As a general rule in my current practice, I don’t get involved in these.

So if you happen to call me because you have some sort of license charge and I ask you to clarify, this is what I’m trying to get at. These are two different things that are very different to handle; I’m not just being pedantic.

Speaking of pedantic, if I say your license is revoked, but you argue that it’s just suspended, you’re wasting our time. Your license isn’t valid, it’s no good, these are, for purposes of this conversation, the same thing. So don’t be annoying about it.

Here’s another installment in my series of articles about what a personal injury attorney does for you when you have an accident in North Carolina.

We’ve talked in previous articles about liability investigations and the do this/don’t do that instructions that attorneys do at the beginning of your claim, as well as insurance coverage issues involving liability insurance, first party auto insurance, and health insurance (and the intersection of the three). That’s already a lot, for sure. But obviously, there’s more.

After we’ve established the liability argument on your claim and determined what insurance coverages are available/relevant, we’re now going to be walking you through your treatment and recovery. I tell clients almost on a daily basis that I NEVER make health care decisions for them, but it is my job to help them understand the consequences of their health care decisions on their claims. We should be providing input on how their treatment choices (or non-choices, as the case may be) will impact their claim. We will also provide impetus when needed. For example: Sometimes it’s time to get a second opinion, but it’s hard for clients to see the forest for the trees, as they say. Sometimes it’s just time to try to push the claim forward even if you aren’t done, but other times it makes sense to wait. Having an experienced attorney will help you to see which is which.

Once it’s time, we will then get all of your treatment records and bills, which will be instrumental in developing what’s called your demand brochure, which is the package that the insurance carriers will receive from us outlining your case and our demands. Letting your attorney get your records and bills is key to a smooth demand process. Acting as your own gatekeeper for these things will almost always just make things slower and worse, so let us do our job. We will also instruct you on what other documentation we’d want for the demand. Typically, in addition to records and bills, we’ll want to include lost income documentation and a pain journal. These are unique to every case so having good, reliable guidance on how to craft them is key.

Be on the lookout for the next installment.

As promised, here’s another in the series of what a personal injury attorney does for you after you have an auto accident (specifically in North Carolina).

But first, a side note: I can’t possibly write about everything we might do for a client or else I’d do nothing but write and not actually help clients. This series of blog posts is just a summary of what we normally do on a normal case, to help you understand why you could probably use the help. So let’s move on.

After we get a good idea as to the strength of your liability argument and what you should be doing/not doing, we’re already digging into coverage. What does that mean?

There’s a ton of insurance issues that are related to auto accidents in North Carolina. The first is getting in touch with the liability carrier (that’s the insurance company for the person who caused the accident). This does several things: First, it puts them on notice to stop contacting you. One of the biggest problems in injury claims is clients saying the wrong things (often because they’re tricked into doing so) when insurance company reps call them. So this should nip that in the bud. Second, it makes the carrier look into coverage to make sure the liability policy was active. If it’s not, that’s not the end of your claim necessarily, but it will make us take some other actions in response.

Next, we’ll get in touch with your auto insurance carrier. You might have Medical Payments coverage which could really impact your overall recovery. Also, you might have need to access your Underinsured Motorist Coverage. You have a contractual duty to notify your carrier of potential claims as soon as possible, so it’s important to do this early in the claim. This will, depending on the case, get your attorney to look into your UIM limits and determine if we need to look for more coverage, potentially.

Also, we’ll talk about using your health insurance for your treatment. Generally, you should! Chiropractors prefer that you not, often, and that’s fine. But you should make sure your health insurance is being billed for all of your other health care treatment. We will also inquire as to the type of health plan you have. You might have a plan with a “right of reimbursement” on third party claims, which they may call “subrogation” (which isn’t always the right word, but whatever). This means that if they pay for treatment and we get a settlement from an auto carrier, we have to use the settlement to pay them back. Once again, not the end of the world or anything, but we need to look into that. The most common types of plans that have this right are Medicare, Medicaid, State Employee Health Plans, and ERISA plans.

And we’ve just gotten started! Stay tuned for another riveting blog post on this super sexy topic.

If you want to know what a personal injury attorney does for you after an accident, the short answer is A LOT.

The surprising tidbit that most people don’t get is that litigating your claim is almost the LAST thing a personal injury attorney is likely to do for you.

But between the quick “A LOT” answer and the surprisingly answer that litigation isn’t the main thing, there’s a ton of things we can talk about.

This is going to be a series of posts, so don’t expect me to cover it all here. In fact, don’t expect me to cover it all in the entire series. The reality is that we do so much for clients that it’s hard to lay it all out for people to see. But let’s start at the beginning…

The first thing we personal injury attorneys do for you is to help you understand what you have. We evaluate your liability situation (is the bad guy really responsible or not?) and help you to understand why or why not that’s the case. I can’t tell you how many times people have called all indignant about their accident, only to have me explain to them that they were actually the ones that were at fault. It happens. And in North Carolina, which is a contributory negligence state, sometimes the potential client merely has some fault in the accident, but not all, and it’s still a bar to the claim. Sucks, but it’s what we have to work with. Then there’s the majority of calls where my client is not at fault. What do we do then?

The next thing is helping you to do what you should and not do what you shouldn’t. The simplest advice I give to people is that it’s like Miranda warnings; everything you say can and will be used against you, so watch it! Other than talking there are tons of other do’s and don’t’s: Keeping a pain journal, but not blabbing on social media. Getting treatment, but not running up a bill. Making sure you’re listening to all of your body’s complaints, but not becoming a hypochondriac.

In the immortal words of TV pitchmen, But wait! There’s more! That’s going to have to be for another post. Stay tuned.

If you’ve gotten a speeding ticket in Orange County, North Carolina (Chapel Hill or Hillsborough court location) give me a call at 919-929-2992. I’ve been handling these things right here since 2001 so I know what’s up. Why waste your time trying to figure out how to handle this when I already know how?

Nobody but insurance agents likes talking about insurance but in this modern world it’s a necessity. Here’s a scary fact: The majority of drivers in North Carolina carry the North Carolina minimum liability limits of $30,000. If a person with that coverage runs you over and ruins your life, the chances of you getting anything more than $30,000 from them are pretty darn slim. So how can you avoid this nightmare? I can’t believe I’m writing this but BUY MORE INSURANCE!

What you really want is as much “Underinsured Motorist” (or UIM as we call it) coverage as you can get. What that coverage does is it helps to cover you against losses that are over and above the policy limits of another driver. So in the example above, if the bad guy only has a $30k policy, that might be all you can get from him/his carrier, but if you have let’s say $100k UIM coverage, then you have access to an extra $70k (the difference between the two coverages).

This becomes more an more important the more catastrophic your injuries from an accident are. In the above example, will $100k in total coverage do if you lost a leg? I think my leg is worth more than $100k, for sure, and I bet you think yours is, too.

Talk to your insurance agent about this and get as much UIM as you can manage. You may never use it, but you’ll sleep better knowing you have it, and you’ll darn sure be happy you have it in case you do need it.

Auto accident injury claims are complicated enough when we’re dealing with just one set of rules. But when you get other state’s laws and policies involved, it can get super nutty super quick.

As a personal injury attorney in a college town, I see this scenario more often than I’d like: You are from out of state and have health insurance from that state and are covered by an auto policy in that state. Then you’re in an auto accident in North Carolina. How will those other out of state plans be involved?

As often, the answer is this: It depends.

We are a “liability” state, which means that if someone causes an accident then their liability insurance should cover our damages. Some states have Personal Injury Protection (PIP) coverage that is sort of the opposite; with PIP, your plan covers you regardless of who caused the accident. In those states, the PIP coverage jumps in line ahead of your health plan (often, but not always) and becomes primarily responsible for paying for your treatment. So if you are in an accident in NC but are insured out of state, you’ll want to talk to both of your other coverages (auto and health) to determine how they see their obligations.

With your health plan you’ll need to know

• Will they pay for treatment out of state?
• Will they pay for that treatment if it’s related to an auto accident?
• If they pay for treatment, does your particular plan have a right of reimbursement, allowing them to seek repayment for what they paid out? If so, from whom?

With your auto coverage you’ll need to know

• Do you have PIP coverage?
• Will that PIP coverage pay for treatment out of state?
• Will that PIP coverage pay for treatment related to an accident that occurred out of state?
• What right of repayment, if any, do they claim over your injury claim proceeds from other parties?

This is all so wacky and not fun that you might want to ignore it, but you do so at your peril. Don’t get caught holding the bag in this situation. Talk to an attorney who can guide you through this. Call me at 919-929-2992.

Here’s the hard truth: No one can tell you what your claim is worth. But people with experience in the industry have opinions that are WAY more informed than yours, I assure you.

Our system is built around the idea that if two adverse parties can’t agree to settle a case then it gets tried in front of a jury and the jury gets to tell you what it’s worth, if anything. There are a lot of things you should know about this and what you might be considering when you are trying to figure out what your settlement should be.

The first thing you should know about this process is that neither you nor any of your friends are going to be on that jury. In fact, it’s going to consist of 12 people who are probably put out with you for making them sit there and lose time from work or whatever. Think about what the person who dislikes you the most in this world might give you for your case and that’s a way more realistic valuation of your claim than what YOU think it’s worth.

The second thing you should know about that process is it’s very uncertain. You might have the best claim in the world, but one evidentiary ruling, one stumbly bumbly expert witness, one slip of the lip in examination and you might find out your case isn’t worth ANYTHING. There are tons of moving parts in a trial and nothing, at all, is certain.

The third thing you should know is that if you have a personal injury attorney, especially one with over two decades of experience in NC auto accident injury claims (*THIS GUY RIGHT HERE*) his opinion as to the value of your case is, to be blunt, far better informed than what you would like your case to be worth. We would all like to get a bazillion dollars, but that doesn’t mean we should get a bazillion dollars. When an experienced attorney is valuing a case they are taking into consideration perhaps hundreds of cases they’ve handled in the past, verdicts they’ve seen or read about, not to mention the facts of your case relative to the law. You might have really good damages (so a high value?) but really bad liability (so a much lower, perhaps zero value?). There is a TON to consider in valuing cases so don’t take the opinion of your attorney lightly.

The last thing you should know is that settlement values are about compromise. Maybe you could get more at trial. Maybe. But what is it going to cost you to get there. Even if you get a slightly higher number, did your fees increase? What were your litigation costs? You might have a better overall number but walk away with LESS than if you’d just settled. So remember, compromise is about give and take. You give SO that you can be certain about what you can take.

When you’re injured in an automobile accident in North Carolina forces begin working immediately on the part of the liability insurance company to minimize what they’re going to have to pay you. The longer you wait to put your own forces in place the more likely it is to blow up in your face.

I get it. You don’t want to “make a big deal” out of it. You want to be the tough person who doesn’t need help. But what does that get you? It gets you taken advantage of. The liability insurance company is going to start gathering evidence – including things they’ll trick you into saying – against you and your case to help minimize their liability. Do you know how to combat that? If you do, awesome! Hop to it! But chances are you don’t because it’s not your job. If you have a leak, call a plumber. If you have a personal injury case, call a personal injury attorney. We can help make sure you’re taken care of in accordance with the law. You might not feel good about getting hurt, but we’ll do our best to make you feel like you were treated fairly.

Call me at 919-929-2992.