Personal Injury Insurance
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Personal injury insurance is certainly a must for almost anyone in business or who owns any kind of property. Since anyone can file a law suit for almost anything, many people understand the importance of having themselves protected against such action. While 97% of all civil lawsuits are dismissed by the courts, it's the other three percent that can bring financial ruin to a business or an individual. A house, car, profession, hobby or dog can all bring liability issues with them and personal injury insurance can help mitigate their risks. Here is how the law looks at personal injury.
The causes of personal injury are twofold; the first being negligence and the second intentional. Negligence is the one that catches most people by surprise and the one for which most people buy liability protection. Negligence is carelessness and the burden of proof in a civil case is on the plaintiff to show that the defendant did not exercise reasonable care to keep a harmful situation from occurring. Because so many things can occur on one's home property, in a car or at a business, the need for personal injury insurance certainly cannot be overemphasized. The lack of fencing around a swimming pool, the failure to trim trees that fall one a person or house, the omission of shoveling snow on the sidewalk, a dog bite, a fall down stairs and an almost endless list can be cited as reason of negligence and a motive for filing a civil suit. Intentional negligence might be the lack of security in a nursing home that allows someone to come in and rob or harm residents. Intentional personal injury would not be nearly as prevalent in filings as negligent personal injury suits.
Certain possessions may require extra personal injury insurance such as owning a swimming pool or a certain breed of dog. Certain hobbies may require more insurance such as flying radio controlled planes. But the scope of personal injury goes beyond physical injury all the way to slander and defamation of character as well as invasion of privacy. Writers, journalists, creators of blogs and other communication forms must be constantly wary of these types of injurious applications in their writing and would be wise to carry ample personal injury insurance protection on themselves to help pay for lawsuits against them. Countless numbers of persons have the mistaken idea that trying to live by the Ten Commandments (the law) will somehow be pleasing to God and get them into heaven, but read these words carefully. "Knowing that a man is not justified by the works of the law, but by the faith of Jesus Christ, even as we have believed in Jesus Christ, that we might be justified by the faith of Christ and not by works of the law: for by the works of the law shall no flesh be justified." (Galatians 2:16)
Most states require that drivers carry enough liability insurance to cover a small lawsuit against them in case of an accident. Some state requires as little as $12,500 personal injury insurance protection, but that seems almost laughable in the face of many suits that are filed for over a million dollars. And many homeowners do carry a policy along with property protection on their house to cover some "fall down the stairs" types of suits and some dog bite filings. Whether or not the liability ceilings are high enough to significantly protect a homeowner from losing his house can only be answered in a frank discussion with one's agent. Of course, the most well-known type of personal injury insurance is medical malpractice insurance. The reason for many doctors getting out of the practice of medicine, this type of PI insurance can run tens of thousands of dollars each year from some specialized physicians. Of course, whenever lawsuits in this arena pop up, the money figures are often stratospheric.
When someone is injured and has filed a personal injury claim against an insurance company, which certainly can be done without an attorney, but remember that that company will do everything it can to minimize or negate your ability to collect. Talking to people on the other end of the phone will often appear to be like talking to a family member who cares for you very much but do not be fooled for one second. If the reader is absolutely bent on going it alone, remember that a record of what is being said is being created and nothing said is a freebie. In other words, every word will be used against you later on.
The lesson here is that if you have been injured, get an attorney and don't mess things up on your own. Choosing a personal injury attorney can be hard, but with some research, a good choice for you can be made. Look for an attorney who specializes in personal injury insurance cases and ask questions like length of experience, what chances you have of collecting and will the attorney go hard after a big collection or look for a more compromised decision. There are online helps to find out the ratings of a firm or attorney and that would probably bring some peace of mind. And before one ever faces the specter of a liability lawsuit, the most obvious advice would be to sit down with your insurance agent and have a long look at the exposure window one has.
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