Understanding Personal Injury Lawsuits
If you are pursuing a personal injury lawsuit on your own
, you will need to keep several things in mind. First of all, you will need to make sure that you know how much money you want in compensation.Personal injury lawsuits are all tied up with emotion, pain, rules, and nitpicky regulations. These lawsuits are hard on the injured because they are suffering through pain and often emotion and psychological issues.
Their loved ones are also often suffering with emotion and psychological heartbreak at seeing this person hurt. Sometimes, they even suffer financially because the injured person cannot work.
Personal injury lawsuits are designed to help these people receive compensation for their losses when the injury was someone else's fault. For example, if someone developed carpal tunnel while working an office job overtime due to repetitive movement, the workplace should compensate them for lost wages, doctors bills, and so forth because the injury occurred as a result of the work.
However, not all responsible parties are willing to pay for the damages. In these cases, the claim must be taken to court for the final decision by a judge.
There are several things you will want to make sure that you understand before you go to court over a personal injury claim. The first thing you will need to understand is the claim process.
Be sure to look up definitions of words that you do not understand that you hear people using in relation to personal injury claim lawsuits. This will help you understand what you lawyer is saying when he or she talks with you.
When you get to court you will be able to understand the proceedings there better as well. As you pursue your claim, you will probably have to deal with some insurance companies.
Many people are scared to do this because of past experiences with their own insurance companies and because the insurance process seems mysterious and unknown. However, if you educate yourself and become more familiar with the processes and with the terms that they use, you will understand what they are trying to communicate and you may be able to work out a deal without going to court.
If you try to work your claim out on your own, you will start by filing a claim with the insurance company. Then, the insurance company will offer an amount lower than your claim and the negotiations will go back and forth.
When you finally come to an agreement, it can be settled and you will be given the amount of money that you agreed on. Of course, to make the initial claim, you must calculate the compensation amount you hope to receive.
This amount should include all doctor's bills, medical bills, and other financial losses related to the injury. State this amount as the amount you deserve on your claim and list what it covers.
In addition, make sure you decide on the lowest amount of money you are willing to accept in compensation before you file your claim. Otherwise you will give in to the insurance company's low offers and you will miss out on some of the money you deserve and would have otherwise received.
Do not tell the insurance what your lowest acceptable amount is or they will automatically take that and you will still miss out on possibly receiving more money. Sometimes the counter offers made may seem ridiculous to you.
However, the insurance company may not feel like it is ridiculous at all. If this is the case, ask the insurance company why they offered that amount.
This will help you understand them better so that you will be able to negotiate according to their concerns and your strong points for a higher price more easily. Other times the extremely low offer is a negotiation tactic that can help get you to settle for less when you would not have otherwise settled for that amount.
If you choose to dispute their reasons for offering such a low amount, be sure to write a nice letter answering all of their concerns. Do not break out into yelling at them or your case will be classified as emotionally unstable until further notice and you will not be able to pursue your claim until much later.
Of course, once you have come to an agreement, you will want to make sure that you get your agreement in writing from the insurance company. Nothing is binding legally until it is written down.
Make sure you hold onto it so that it does not get lost. Having the verbal agreement written down will prevent the insurance company from going against the agreement and giving you less or nothing at all.
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