An Ounce of Prevention - Protecting Yourself From a Liability Claim

I see it happen too often, the customer. Routinely used in auto injury claims and premises liability claims (such as slip and fall).

The overwhelming majority of car owners and homeowners have insurance policies for insulation and protection from claims for personal injuries. But when an accident occurs, they are often the same big, expensive mistake.

The end result is an unnecessary waste of money of the customer on the attorney's fees andExperts and, at worst, the client still satisfy a negative verdict, or to solve a liability, he or she simply can not afford to fight.

You did not make the same mistake. Insurance is nothing more than a contract, and like most contracts have two sides to meet commitments. Contained Luckily, despite all the legalese in insurance, most policies require that you do one simple thing (apart from the payment of premiums) inTo protect himself from a liability claim.

For the sake of discussion, we use an auto personal injury claim as an example. A customer in a car accident. The driver, a passenger in another car, or even a passenger in the car, she complains, "I think my neck hurts."

But it's just a little fender-bender. Nobody calls the police. Nobody says anything to their insurance carrier. The customer is shaken a little bit emotional, but lifecontinues.

Sometimes, almost tragic, the customer called her lawyer right after the accident. You know, a lawyer who did a flat end for them in the past. Maybe a corporate lawyer who is a friend of the family, or maybe he or she drew a will for them too. He or she does not know the first thing about dealing with a personal injury claim or action. They advise customers to sit down. "Do not worry about anything, unless and untilYou will be sued. "

Then two, maybe three years later, shows someone at the customer location to serve a summons. The Customer is for damages, which sued in a personal injury action.

At this point, the customer is usually back to complain to her lawyer and friend of the fact that the plaintiff was not really injured. Perhaps it is a false claim, such as whiplash you see on TV. It does not matter, though. Also, the lawyer does not know good personal injury claims are confident that the actionimmediate attention. You are finally the thing for me, and I must be the one who break the bad news.

I have a bracket on the demand of customers, and they will be a significant one. Why? Not because I enjoy hunting down the unfortunate, but because I have two battles at hand, that must involve many hours of work. First I have to start defending the client in the personal injury case. Secondly, and I'll try to start working on to get the client insuranceTo ensure the carrier collection and a defensive step - a daunting task, which is sometimes successfully, sometimes not.

But here's the key: If the customer reported the incident to his insurance on time, the company would quickly step in and handle everything, not only providing coverage on liability claims, but also a legal argument for the client and consultant to pay for that defense is the case.

I can almost guarantee that if you take out the insurance and read the fineprint, you'll notice that the insurance carrier no obligation to guarantee the collection or a defense, if you do not call in a report in a timely manner. It's rare someone gets into a car accident and is not aware of. Even if someone borrowed your car and got into an accident, there was a good chance to know them. Your duty is to the air carrier as soon as possible if you have reason to believe that someone has a liability claim against you to be informed.

Ito understand the thinking here. Some people really buy insurance to protect against liability claims. Other forms of insurance maintained only because the law requires it to register a car or a bank is needed for a house before lending you money to buy a house. People do not naturally take up their premiums due to a "blemish" on their journey or to increase an incident at her home or at your workplace. But is it worth the risk, the cost of defending a liability obligation on yourto save themselves on insurance premiums?

Keep in mind that the average customer of mine in more than U.S. $ 30,000 spending in legal fees to defend my company to have a personal injury case from beginning to end. And you can conservatively add another $ 10.000 5.000 $ up when an expert needs to be set to testify.

Oh, and do not forget that the applicant will be sued for damages. When you do connect to any insurance in force, to protect you, you can click on the hook for a lot more than lawyers' s andExpert fees if a jury found not liable.

This is all money that can easily by timely notification of potential liability claims to an insurance carrier can be avoided.

So next time when you believe that your insurance premium if you have an accident report, you can increase the insurance carrier, might think about how much it cost, you could defend even a baseless claim for personal injury.