![]() Items such as a police report, photos from the scene and the contact information for any witnesses will help prove you weren’t to blame. You may need to help establish that the other person was indeed at fault, especially if they start finger-pointing at you. Or You Could SueĪnother way to get compensation is to hire a lawyer and sue the other driver. ![]() In any case, having gap insurance can provide the difference between the insurance payment and the loan/lease balance. This can happen, for example, if you financed most of the cost of the car, or you have a vehicle that has lost value quickly. In some cases you could owe more on a car loan or lease than what the car was worth. If your vehicle was totaled in the accident, insurance should compensate you for the value of the car at the time of the accident-whether you’re making a liability claim against someone else or using your own collision insurance.īut that doesn’t mean the problem is solved. If you have rental reimbursement coverage, you could tap that as well for a rental while your vehicle is in the repair shop for a collision claim. You might get that deductible amount back later if your insurance company goes after reimbursement from the other person’s insurer. The downside is that your insurance check will be reduced by your collision deductible amount. If you have collision insurance, you can use it for car damage caused by someone else. You could decide to use your own insurance for car damage, rather than dealing with the other person’s insurance company. It can cover medical bills when the other driver doesn’t have enough insurance. One option is to turn to your own underinsured motorist coverage, if you have it. What if the driver doesn’t have enough insurance to cover accident injuries they cause to others? You could still sue them for the remainder, but if they don’t have any assets it may not be worth it. These can be used for injury claims for you and your passengers, Situation No. In states without no-fault laws, PIP and a similar coverage called medical payments (MedPay) are often available. (Property damage claims can still usually be made on the other person’s liability insurance.) In many cases there needs to be serious injury or death before you sue someone else for a car crash in a no-fault state. You can sue another driver only when you meet certain qualifications, which each state defines. These states require personal injury protection (PIP insurance) for this purpose. In states with no-fault insurance laws, you always make injury claims on your own insurance first. But in some cases you might need to turn to your own auto insurance, even when someone else crashed into you. And when someone else has caused an accident, it’s natural to feel that they should pay for what they did. Using Your Own Insurance to Fix the Problemīut if insurance claims were simple, we could all feel like insurance experts. The insurer might want to investigate the accident to determine that their customer truly was at fault. The other person’s insurer will process the claim, but don’t count on a quick payment. This is called a third-party claim: You’re the third party to the other driver and their insurance company. If someone else crashes into you, in the simplest scenario you’ll make a claim against their liability insurance. Making an Insurance Claim Against Someone Else About three million people are injured or killed in these car accidents, so there are a huge number of lawsuits and insurance claims every year. There are about 6 million crashes reported by police every year in the U.S., according to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration. If Walker does make an insurance claim, she’s not alone. She’s frustrated enough to file a claim against the insurer of the car that hit her. That same driver was involved in another accident less than a month later which killed a pedestrian.Īmong the problems: She hasn’t yet received a settlement from any insurance company, she has no car and she still has to make loan payments on the Honda that’s now rusting in a recycling center. Walker considers herself lucky she wasn’t hurt. Little more than a week after she purchased her used 2006 Honda Civic, it was smashed and totaled by a hit-and-run driver who-according to the police report-zoomed through a red light. She proved it by navigating a school bus full of noisy and, occasionally, boisterous children on country roads and city streets for 22 years.īut even good drivers can have bad accidents. Christin Walker of Burlington, New Jersey, is a safe driver.
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