Legal Blog

There are several dishonest tactics utilized by insurance companies to minimize and avoid payment of these claims, and an injured party should be extremely careful in any dealings they have with the accident liability insurance company. Insurance adjusters are trained to “take control of the case” and “gain the trust” of the injured victim, and having done so then utilize various tactics to lull the person who is disabled and/or hurting, into doing things they would not ordinarily do in taking care of their injury, and then find out later that they were deceived by the insurance adjuster to create pretexts for denial of the claim. 

One example of the common devices or schemes insurance companies use to minimize and deny payment to an injured victim is through the utilization of so-called computer analysis of the claim. They will tell a person that their claim has been analyzed by the computer and the computer has generated the settlement value of the claim. This lends an air of authenticity to the offer, when in fact this is perhaps the most dishonest tactic utilized by the insurance industry to gain profits they do not deserve at the expense of injured people. 

Insurance companies employ a variety of tricks and schemes to avoid or reduce payments owed to an injured person. It is impossible to list or fully explain each and every one of their tactics. The intention of the following list, however, is to provide you with some warning when you see the following schemes being implemented in your case.

1. A TELEPHONE CALL WITH THE INSURANCE COMPANY IN WHICH THEY INFORM YOU THAT THE CALL IS BEING MONITORED FOR SO-CALLED “TRAINING OR QUALITY CONTROL PURPOSES”. This is nothing more than a clever way to violate your privacy rights and they are in fact recording your phone call. The law requires that you consent to the recording of the call, however, they get around this requirement by informing you of the “monitoring” and if you do not object, they will claim that you impliedly consented to the recording. Why are they recording your phone call? They alleged reason is to train or maintain “quality control”, but the actual reason is that in these phone calls they will often ask you what appear to be innocent questions, but in fact are designed to trap you into making a mistake which they can exploit in defending your claim. When they ask you to describe the accident, it is not to educate them concerning the facts of the case. They have contact with their insured, and if there has been a police report, they have the report to review. What information are you going to add to make them pay a claim that they would other wise deny? If their insured has admitted fault to them, the only reason that they would want a statement from you is to see if you say something inadvertently that can allow them to evade payment. If their insured has not admitted responsibility, it is rather naive to expect that your different version is going to encourage the insurance company to pay a claim which their insured has conveniently given them an excuse to deny. In summary, there is no advantage to you whatsoever to give any recorded statements to any insurance company, unless you are represented by counsel at the time of the recording. It should also be pointed out that having recorded your statement, they will almost always refuse to provide you with a copy of the statement. They will certainly refuse to provide you with a copy of their insured’s statement. Since you do not have access to the statement, you should also consider the possibility that your statement, since it is completely within the control of the company that owes you payment, can be altered and/or edited, or perhaps conveniently “lost”, in the event that it is to their advantage. Never give a recorded statement when you do not have simultaneous access to the recording to guarantee that it is not altered or edited to your disadvantage.

Choosing the right personal injury attorney may be the most important decision an injured person makes in the presentation of a bodily injury claim following an automobile accident, or any other personal or bodily injury claim, such as motorcycle, pedestrian, truck or bike accidents. 

Unfortunately, there are very little legal rules in place to guarantee that a lawyer holding themselves out as an expert in personal injury litigation is in fact qualified in the field. California does not have a specialization requirement for personal injury attorneys, and sadly, the law permits any licensed attorney to accept and handle cases for personal injuries, no matter how complex or involved! 

Of critical importance is that the client should find out how much knowledge the attorney has of the particular injury you have suffered? An experienced personal injury lawyer should have a wide range of medical knowledge, and be well-versed in the specifics of your injury, otherwise they will not know how to present the claim to the insurance company, and just as importantly, without knowledge of the medicine involved in your injury, the attorney will not be qualified to monitor the care the injured person is receiving. 

Cervical, thoracic, and lumbar spine injuries (back and neck injuries), which are quite common, have very specific diagnostic needs as well as treatment needs. Failing to recognize issues can have a very harmful effect on eventually winning your case if the attorney does not understand the issues. Yet another example is in the case of a head or concussion type of injury. Doctors often misdiagnose or fail to treat this injury, and it is very important for the lawyer to recognize early on the issues related to any sort of head injury. The person who has suffered a head injury will also often not even realize they are suffering post-concussion or head injury symptoms. Many times, the injured person or client will not even know they have suffered a concussion or other type of head injury, and it is crucial that the attorney makes an early inquiry into the existence of this injury. 

The answer to this question is perhaps the easiest answer of all. A consultation with a personal injury attorney should never cost you anything! Any attorney that would charge you for merely consulting them regarding the merits of your case is an attorney you should avoid. Any competent, reliable personal injury attorney will provide you, at no charge, a free consultation to discuss the merits of your case and answer questions you may have concerning your rights and how to proceed with your case. Since consulting with an attorney will not cost you anything, you should consult with a personal injury attorney who is an expert in the field of your particular case as soon as possible following your injury.

Dealing with the insurance company without having first consulted an attorney is a risky proposition, at best, and all too often leads to situations where the insurance company is able to deny your claim, or reduce the payment. Insurance companies are experts in implementing ploys that allow them to evade paying people what is owed to them, and if you wait to consult an attorney until after the insurance company has successfully implemented its plan to avoid paying you, all too frequently it is too late for an attorney to stop it.

A common attorney’s fee charged by personal injury lawyers who are competent and intend to provide full services to their client is a one-third (33 1/3%) contingency fee if the case does not require litigation. There are some so-called “discount” lawyers who will offer to handle personal injury cases for a twenty-five percent contingency fee. The Cooper Law Firm is not a discount law firm and we do not take cases where we will provide less than full legal representation. If you are considering hiring one of the so-called “discount” lawyers, you should ask yourself what is it about that firm’s practices that permits it to charge less for its services. Do they do it by providing less service? Do they do it by having work that a lawyer should, or would ordinarily, perform and instead have that work performed by non-lawyers? Will the “discount” lawyer personally make all tactical and strategic decisions, including the actual negotiation of the claim, with the insurance company? A consumer should be very careful hiring a lawyer who discounts his or her fees, and you should make sure that the lawyer you are contracting with is going to actually perform and make the legal decisions, and such are not being delegated to non-lawyers. 

Another issue you should be aware of with respect to not only discount lawyers, but any contingency lawyer, is to make sure that they do not charge any fees simply to open your file, or take your case. Some lawyers will advertise a discount fee, but will charge you a “cost” for opening the file, or doing some other ministerial act. You should regard this effectively as a fee, and understand that you are then effectively paying more than the agreed upon contingency percentage. A contingency fee lawyer should not charge you anything unless he or she is successful on the case, and you should not be charged for the ministerial acts of his or her office taking your case and/or opening a file.

Many clients have come into this firm telling us that they thought they had nothing to worry about in terms of receiving a fair settlement because they were dealing with their own insurance company because they were lulled into the belief that after having paid premiums to their insurance company, there would be some reciprocal feeling of gratitude on the part of the insurance company. Similarly, there have been many stories of clients having trusted the adjuster for the other party’s insurance company, then feeling betrayed when the promises they thought had been made were not kept. When one considers whether or not to trust the insurance company, it makes no difference whether you are dealing with the other parties’ insurance company, or if you are dealing with your own. In each case, the insurance company is motivated to eliminate or minimize any claim payment that would be owed to you. They value you as a customer when they are taking your check, but your value to them is gone under any circumstance in which they may have to write you a check. You should deal with them, accordingly.