Interacting with Insurance Companies Following a Clearwater Truck Accident

Following a truck accident in Clearwater, an insurance company will generally call you within a day or two of the collision, and leave a message telling you to call them back just to talk about the accident. Unfortunately, before you know it, you will have given a recorded statement that can be used later against you in your truck accident case. Regardless of whether or not you have already spoken with the truck driver’s insurance company, speaking with a Clearwater truck accident lawyer is the best way to protect yourself from being taken advantage of by an insurance adjuster.

Risk of Giving Recorded Statements

It is not uncommon for the truck driver’s insurance company to call the other driver right after the accident to get a recorded statement. They tend to call surprisingly quickly with the aim of somehow getting the driver to admit fault, or at least to admit some kind of contributory negligence in the case.

If an insurance company calls a person seeking information about a Clearwater truck accident case, and the person has not retained a truck accident lawyer, they should not take part in this phone call and avoid offering any statements that may be recorded. Everything a person says in a recorded statement is logged and can be used against their accident claim.

However, if the person has an attorney, the lawyer can serve as a buffer between their client and the truck driver’s insurance company, and will make sure nothing inappropriate is going on. An experienced truck accident lawyer will prepare clients to make recorded statements, and will go through the facts of the case with the client first, as opposed to the claimant solely representing themselves and being stuck in a vulnerable position with a powerful insurance company trying to take advantage of them.

The lethal combination of catchy slogans designed to make people feel safe, and the assumption that being an insurance company’s paying customer should reasonably mean adequate benefits will be provided causes people to think that the insurance company is helping them and that they can convince the insurance company that the truck driver is at fault and should clearly pay for the claimant’s medical bills. Unfortunately, the reality is that insurance adjusters are trained in order to get people to admit to certain things with the end goal of using that information against a person in their injury claim, so although a driver may be as insured as they can be, the truck driver’s insurance company, like any opposing insurance company in an accident case, will do everything they can to avoid making compensatory payments.

What to Look Out For

Insurance companies know that people who have sustained injuries in truck accidents are often in need of money as quickly as they can get their hands on it. An insurance adjuster knows to take advantage of this vulnerable position by offering the injured driver a small sum of money to settle their case, even though the insurance company is well-informed and knows that the person’s injury and total recovery costs are worth well more than the company is offering. Insurance companies will do whatever they can to convince the injured driver to accept the check and sign a binding settlement statement that prevents the driver from being able to sue for their injuries later on.

Risks of Cashing An Insurance Check

Many times an insurance adjuster will call someone who has been involved in a truck accident and try to settle the case for pennies on the dollar, for what the case is actually worth. The advantage that the insurance company has over the driver is the ability to offer money upfront, when the person is very likely in a situation that demands significant sums of money as soon as possible. As soon as a person cashes a check from an insurance company, they have accepted that settlement. Once the driver has signed on the dotted line, they cannot go back.

The primary danger in this is if someone accepts a check, signs a settlement, and cashes the check a day or two after the accident, they might not begin to feel their injuries until a week later. The worst situation an injured driver can find themselves in when dealing with insurance companies is dealing with the onset of significant pain that will require treatment costing more than the accepted settlement, when it is already too late to go back and undo the settlement.