Insurance Auto Deductibles
April 26th, 2008
Question: Can anyone answer my question about my auto insurance policy?
okay, last december 2005 I was involved in a minor car accident due to weather conditions, and I had to pay my auto insurance company a “500 Deductible” to repair the damages that I made to my vehicle, so they had fixed it. This august of 2007, I recieve a letter from my insurance policy attorney stating that I am being sue by the plantiff of the vehicle that I hit. Why I’m being sued if I was cover by my insurance policy and the plantiff car, and is there anything I can do to defend myself. Because they should go after my insurance company if they didn’t pay for the plantiff car…. not me.
Answer: Apparently your insurance company was not able to get the claim with the other party settled and the other party elected to file a law suit.
If it was a minor accident – the other person may have gotten a bit crazy with the medical treatment and run up a bunch of bills that your insurance company does not think are related to this accident.
The other person can not sue the insurance company. The law suit can not read “John Doe vs. XYZ Insurance Company”. The law suit has to be filed against you since you are the negligent party. You are the one who caused the damage/injuries.
The law suit also has to be served on you – not the insurance company. This is usually done by process server or certified mail. As soon as you get the suit papers -call the person who wrote you the letter – ASAP! The insurance company has a limited time to get an answer on file and the clock starts when you get the papers. Failure to get the answer in on time results in a default judgement against you (not good for you).
The insurance company will need to know when you got the papers and how. They will need the original papers but can give you a copy for your records.
Your insurance company will hire an attorney to defend you.
You can choose to hire an attny of your own at your own expense but you don’t need to. The defense attny that your insurance company will hire will be very competent.
You will need to cooperate with the insurance company and the defense attny. They will need to get information from you to answer the law suit. At some point, depositions will be taken and mediation may even happen. Very few lawsuits go to trial.
Most likley – the adjuster sent you the letter to give you a heads up that suit papers may be coming. I send those letters out when the plaintiff attny is really yelling threatening suit. The adjuster expects that the letter will prompt you to call them.
So call the adjuster – he/she will be able to give you more detail on what’s happening and how they will handle it.
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