Personal Injury Lawyer Needed?

My son was recently in an auto accident. He was a backseat passenger in a car that hit a tree. No other vehicles were involved and the driver has assumed fault. My son was in the hospital for 18 days and suffered from a serious internal injury. Thankfully he's on the mend, though it will be several weeks before he's back to normal. He's had to withdraw from college as a result. This happened out of state and as a result we've had almost $10,000 in expenses due to lodging, food, travel, lost wages, co-pays, etc.

Here's my question....Do I hire a lawyer or not? My in-laws who are lawyers (out of state) say yes, my other in-law who used to work in the insurance industry says wait and see what kind of settlement offer is made since a lawyer will take 30% or more in fees (this was also the advice of my insurance adjuster). Funny how the lawyers say get a lawyer and the insurance people say wait.

I would love to hear from other people in a similar situation as to what they did. Did you get a lawyer and were pleased or thought it a waste? Did you not get a lawyer and wished you did?

 

The driver should have had liability insurance covering bodily injury (I have $100k/person, 300k/incident). Squeeze the insurance company to at least reimburse you for the expenses you've had and if you don't feel that's suficient for the pain/suffering, then get a lawyer.

 

IMHO, it depends on the severity of your sons injuries. If his injuries are complex, require long-term recovery or can lead to other possible complications then I would suggest getting a lawyer.

If he has straight-forward injuries (e.g. broken bones, lacerations...) that will heal and that is pretty much the end of it, then I would lean towards waiting to hear from the insurance company.

For simple-remedy types of injuries, insurance companies know how much medical fees typically run and will re-imburse accordingly.

 

I agree. Any offer that the insurance company presents will almost certainly come with a clause forgoing the right to sue at a later point. If the injuries are complex, I'd get the experienced lawyers involved before agreeing to such.

 

I think the rough rule of thumb is the pain and suffering payment is roughly 3 times the medical costs. My wife has been injured twice and the insurance companies in both cases offered 3 times medical.

Good luck.

 

FWIW - in 1998 I was in an accident, ICU for 2 months, several surgeries and 6mo of intense re-hab (I had to learn to walk again). So, due to the severity of my injuries - I did hire a lawyer.

Originally the Insurance firm offered $15K in damages - needless to say after hiring an attorney, the insurance firm added several zeros to their original settlement.

 

Get an attorney, and wait until he has completely healed and has finished all rehab, etc. (if needed). The attorney will most likely file a "demand" of the insurance company and work out a settlement. And fido is correct, the rate is 3 times the total medical bills as a rule.