>>>As it is, my accident ought to be covered by the other persons insurance,
but who knows what shenanigans they will try to pull. I hope my agent
will go to bat for me.
(sorry this is so long, but hope it helps everyone out there. And, Tony, if
you want some more tips on what I found out from my experience, feel free to
e-mail me and I can give you some more lessons I learned -- I'm not an
agent, etc. just giving you the benefit of my own experience which turned
OK --- after taking almost 2 months to reach satisfactory settlement with
the offending driver's insurance company)
Reply:
If you had collision coverage, then yes, you can have your agent/company go
after them (called "subrogate" in insurance lingo) and means they pay you
off, then go after the at-fault party's insurance company & car owner to get
reimbursement for your company's payment(s) to you.
I went through this 4-5 years ago with an '83 3/4 ton Suburban. I was
tooling down the highway, minding my own business, slowing to make a right
turn with my signal on and my daughter in the back seat behind me. I had
slowed to maybe 15-20 mph when in my rear view mirror I observed a speeding
S-10 driver who obviously was not going to be able to stop. I took my foot
off my brake. He hit me doing 55+ mph directly in the rear end left half. I
have a class 5 hitch on the back. This, and the fact Suburbans have a frame
saved my daughter and I from serious injury.
Amazingly, my truck had only a broken left tail light, a smashed tailgate
(no broken glass!!!) and a left rear quarter panel crunched so it prohibited
opening the passenger door behind the driver's door. My front seat, with me
in it now looked like a Lazy Boy recliner as it was laid back about 30 - 40
degrees -- I'm 6 ft 4 in. tall and couldn't reach the steering wheel because
the seat was laid back so far. Fortunately, my daughter and I were only
slightly sore from whiplash. My truck frame was bent almost 2-3 inches
downward and the hitch probably prevented him from coming inside my truck.
My truck was drivable, I just couldn't open the one door.
The offending driver's S-10 Blazer was totaled. It had to be towed away. The
right front was a disaster with fluids all over the road and parts
everywhere. The bumper was pushed onto his right wheel. He cracked the
windshield and split open his forehead. The police cited him for failure to
use due caution, no insurance (he had it but didn't have the card in his
truck), and no seat belt (in court they dropped this because no one could
say for sure if he had it on or not, even though everyone felt he would not
have hit the windshield if he had it on).
ANYWAY: Here is what this is all about--- My body shop said, as long as you
have not settled with his insurance, you are in the driver's seat. You have
leverage and can make them squirm until you are satisfied. If you sign
anything from them, you are screwed because they will have you sign that you
are taking the settlement as "final and complete resolution of all claims".
Also, by law, they must "make you whole" which means bring you back to where
you were prior to the accident. This means that if they agree to repair your
car, they are obligated to fix it even if it costs more than their original
estimate and even if it costs more than if they had "totalled it". If on the
other hand, they estimate it will cost more than 80 percent of the actual
cash value at the time, then they can call it a total loss and try to get
you to settle for some actual cash value determined by them (you of course
DO NOT HAVE TO ACCEPT ANY VALUE THEY OFFER -- negotiate until you are happy
because THEY owe it to YOU!!!) This "total it" rule is why insurance
companies prefer to total out a car rather than say they will repair it if
they think the costs are going to run higher.
Roy Malac
'60 TR3a TS63103LO (in restoration)
techman@metrolink.net
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