Here’s the scenario…You are driving down the highway and traffic comes to a halt. No big deal…you slow to a stop. Seconds later, you hear the sound of metal clashing, plastic cracking, and rubber screeching. You’ve been hit by the driver behind you. Your car is smashed, and you’re scared and in shock. You may feel pain immediately, but more likely than not your adrenaline will be in overdrive and you may not feel anything for several hours or even days or weeks.
You may wonder in the hours, days, and weeks after your car crash whether you have a personal injury claim and whether you need to hire a personal injury attorney. These are important questions.
First, do you even have a personal injury claim?
Let us put this in the simplest terms to answer that question. You have a personal injury claim if you were injured and another person was at fault. If that is the case, you have a personal injury claim, and you should reach out to a personal injury attorney who knows the intricacies of personal injury law and how to fight the insurance companies.
Next, should you hire a lawyer?
You may be thinking: “I’ve got this. I can handle this all by myself.”
We do not recommend the do-it-yourself approach, and here’s why.
First, the insurance company is a large corporation with well-trained adjusters and attorneys whose sole purpose is to save them money. They will try to get you to say something that will hurt your case. They will also try to get you to take a lowball settlement.
We’ve seen insurance companies offer our clients what feels like “chump change”…even though they are still treating their injuries. The insurance companies know that if you settle early in your treatment process, it will save them money. For example, recently we settled a case for a client for $250,000. Before hiring us, the client was offered $5,000. In fact, statistics show that hiring a lawyer will increase the amount of your settlement by 3.5 times what you would have gotten had you not hired a lawyer. Other studies indicate that 91 percent of those who hire a lawyer will receive a monetary award versus on 51 percent of those who did not hire a lawyer, and they received more money because they hired a lawyer.
The bottom line….You will want to even the playing field by having your own attorney. Choosing to go this on your own is like fighting a losing battle. While you may get some money for your injuries, you won’t get what you deserve unless you hire a personal injury lawyer.
We have had some clients who came to us after they tried settling their case on their own. Although we are able to help them with their case, it is always better if they came to us before they started negotiating their personal injury settlement. It is not unlikely for your actions to diminish the value of your claim, if you try to negotiate with the insurance companies without legal representation. Sometimes, we can fix these mistakes, but sometimes we cannot.
This is why you should hire an attorney who specializes in personal injury law, and you should do so right away.
At Debbie Taussig Law, we help clients navigate through the entire process. It can be stressful seeing all the medical bills come in and figuring out who pays what. We take care of this process and make sure that clients are taking advantage of all financial resources available to them to make ends meet. We work with bill collectors and doctors and try to come up with creative solutions so that your bills do not go to collections and so that you can receive the care you need. We help figure out what types of insurance coverage is available so that we can get you the most money possible.
If you hire Debbie Taussig Law, you do not need to deal with any insurance companies at all. We handle all of this. We know how difficult, overwhelming, and frightening it can be when you are dealing with personal injuries and an insurance claim.
Please call us at 303-442-0176 and our team can help you navigate every part of the process of a personal injury claim. Debbie Taussig Law is a woman-owned personal injury law firm in Boulder, Colorado. We handle cases all over the Denver-Boulder metro area, fighting the insurance companies so that our clients can focus on healing from their injuries and protecting their future by getting them the money they deserve.
