Month: May 2016

Will I Get a Larger Settlement If I Go To Court?

The answer to this is of course unknown.  There are so many variables and unknowns to consider. If you have a trial by your peers, the case is worth whatever they say it is worth and if you have a crummy lawyer whom does not present properly your case you could go backwards in your settlement amount. Yet, you do get the satisfaction of your day in court.

Regardless, for us, personally being faced with no other option, we did receive more by going to court.  But what your lawyer is not going to specifically point out is that when you go to court whatever medical bills the insurance company has paid this amount will come out of your final settlement and this is not before he/she gets there percentage.

So basically it will look like:

Court awards $30,000

Minus – Lawyer fee of $10,000
Minus – Medical covered by insurance of $5,000
Minus – Court fees and expenses of $5,000

AND YOUR TOTAL = $10,000

So consider if you are willing to take a chance with the court system.  Do you have a winnable case?  Do you have a good lawyer?  Is the insurance company leaving you with no choice?

4 Things You Can’t Claim on the Witness Stand

1. You were not allowed to say how your insurance unfairly treated you even if this was the reason you did not seek treatment for your injuries in the first place.

2. You can’t say that the insurance adjuster was unfair in dealing with your case and was not even offering a settlement that would cover only your medical bills and not to mention any pain an suffering or loss of wages.

3. Unless presented to the court prior to a certain date, you are not allowed to say the exact total of your recently incurred medical expenses. You were only allowed to claim what had been presented to the court by your lawyer and if they are not advising you correctly this is the reason for a lower settlement amount. The jury can only reward you money for the recovered damages that they are aware of. In my personal experienced over $20,000 worth of medical expenses were not properly presented before trail.

4. You are not allowed to account for what any doctors told you. The opposing counsel will object stating that you are not an expert witness. To get around this, just re-word your testimony by instead of saying “the doctor said” to “after the wreck I had …”.