Auto insurance dispute

[kidicarus13]

Has anyone had any experince with only being able to collect partial damages from the other driver's insurnace company (Allstate) for a private property car crash when it was not your fault? (I guess that is what is in dispute now [Rant1]) What did you do? Turn it over to your insurance company? Dispute it with their insurance company? Hire an attorney? Vehicle damage only and the police were not called.

[Byte Stryke]

Someone call Stuving

[Great-Kazoo]

Any ins claim i always contact my ins co.

[newracer]

Contact your insurance, they will pay you and then go after the other drivers insurance.

[kidicarus13]

Any ins claim i always contact my ins co.

That is planned. Unfortunately my agent's office is closed until Monday. Damage est by Allstate is $1240 so I'm not talking anything too serious here, which I'm THANKFUL for, but when other's mistakes start cutting into my gun $... [facepalm]

[10x]

I threatened to take them to small claims and subpoena the head guy in the area. In the phone call to them I told them I only wanted to know who they wanted served with the papers. Insurance companies don't want the hastle. In my case they wrote a check.

[kidicarus13]

I threatened to take them to small claims and subpoena the head guy in the area. In the phone call to them I told them I only wanted to know who they wanted served with the papers. Insurance companies don't want the hastle. In my case they wrote a check.

Thanks, I tried. They said I would actually subpoena the other driver into court and an Allstate rep would appear to defend their client. This may be the only Friday that I can remember that I can't wait until Monday.

[Great-Kazoo]

Forgot to add you have 10 days? to file a police report. Do it sooner than later. If not the driver may file one that puts you in the wrong, no matter how minor it is.

[Irving]

I can tell you everything you want to know, if you give me enough information.
The fact that it is private property doesn't mean anything one way or another. Ordering a police report after the fact will help you zero. Conversely, it doesn't matter if the other person files a report after the fact either, so it doesn't matter what they say.

Go here: http://www.accidentsketch.com/ and work up an accident diagram and explain what happened and I'll tell you what is going on.

Without any information at all, I can tell you that accidents where both parties are backing are usually broken up into 50/50, and no one gets anything from the other guy (in Colorado anyway). So if you are getting anything from Allstate, then you must have been told that you are less than 49% at fault.

If you don't feel like putting your business up here, send me a PM and I can give you more information.

[brutal]

I can tell you everything you want to know, if you give me enough information.
The fact that it is private property doesn't mean anything one way or another. Ordering a police report after the fact will help you zero. Conversely, it doesn't matter if the other person files a report after the fact either, so it doesn't matter what they say.

Go here: http://www.accidentsketch.com/ and work up an accident diagram and explain what happened and I'll tell you what is going on.

Without any information at all, I can tell you that accidents where both parties are backing are usually broken up into 50/50, and no one gets anything from the other guy (in Colorado anyway). So if you are getting anything from Allstate, then you must have been told that you are less than 49% at fault.

If you don't feel like putting your business up here, send me a PM and I can give you more information.

My wife was at a complete stop after backing out, foot on brake, car in DRIVE, and someone backed into her. MF liars in the other vehicle (two of them) told their ins co both vehicles were moving. Yeehaw, I got to pay the deductible.

People are assoholes.

[Irving]

My wife was at a complete stop after backing out, foot on brake, car in DRIVE, and someone backed into her. MF liars in the other vehicle (two of them) told their ins co both vehicles were moving. Yeehaw, I got to pay the deductible.

People are assoholes.

This is the most common outcome. Someone ALWAYS says they were stopped and putting it into drive. Often times both people will say that. I doubt that the adjuster believed the other person over your wife, in fact, the likely believed your wife because who in the world sees another vehicle backing , and just keeps on backing themselves?

The issue is that there probably was not any tangible evidence (points of impact, video, etc) to prove what happened one way or another. Also, "witnesses" inside the vehicle don't count and can only hurt your case.

[MarkCO]

I do accident reconstruction for a living and there is always more to the story. Chances are very high that Allstate has assigned some portion of blame to you in order to reduce the payment. IF you make a claim against your insurance carrier, and they pay something, but recover nothing from the opposing party in subrogation, then you will likely get surcharged and have an "at fault" accident in your file. Highly unlilkely you will come out ahead in that situation, so probably bad advice to file a claim. However, your insurance certainly requires that you report the accident in 24 hours regardless of fault.

When I was hit by an Allstate insured many years ago, the FIRST question I asked the adjuster was what percentage of blame Allstate assigned me. Totally caught her off guard. When I was told 50/50, I asked for the documentation supporting the fault assignment. The letter, written by an adjuster was weak so I forced the issue by telling them I had consulted an attorney and was prepared to have a PE issue an accident reconstruction report and they risked having their insured found 100% at fault. Four or five phone calls of negotiations ensued with the adjusters supervisor and eventually the head of auto claims. I eventually settled with them for 95% with a letter to my insurance carrier that they found no evidence of fault on my part. Got the reairs done for about 80% of the check amount after settlement.

In most of my cases where I am deposed or testify, I get to see the claims files so I have a pretty good idea where each side is coming from. In most of my cases, the opposing side settles soon after I issue a report and in the rest, a judge or jury has decided the case. My clients have prevailed on every case in which I provided testimony, so I have a decent idea of what I am doing.

[MarkCO]

SNIP... Also, "witnesses" inside the vehicle don't count and can only hurt your case.

Sorry, but that is SO false!

[Irving]

Sorry, but that is SO false!

I think that the claims you see, and the claims that I see are very different in severity. The post I was responding to was a low-impact parking lot accident. In situations like that I don't even bother to take passenger statements because the passengers are likely to be biased.

The reason I said that a biased witness can only hurt you, is because I won't give any weight to their statement in the first place, unless it is different from yours. For example, the other day, this lady very strongly insisted that I speak with her "witness" (i.e. mother) who was riding in the car. I told the lady to go ahead and put her witness on the phone. This lady's mom told a different, and much more realistic story, than the lady driving, and basically outed her daughter as a liar. It really helped me have a better case to assign fault to the driver that so desperately wanted me to talk to her "witness," and was so thoroughly convinced that she wasn't at fault (because she was lying).

[Irving]

I do accident reconstruction for a living and there is always more to the story. Chances are very high that Allstate has assigned some portion of blame to you in order to reduce the payment. IF you make a claim against your insurance carrier, and they pay something, but recover nothing from the opposing party in subrogation, then you will likely get surcharged and have an "at fault" accident in your file. Highly unlilkely you will come out ahead in that situation, so probably bad advice to file a claim. However, your insurance certainly requires that you report the accident in 24 hours regardless of fault.



Lack of subrogation does not equal an automatic "at fault" claim on your CLUE report. Insurance policies often read that claims are required to be reported in a timely manner, but I have yet to see a specific time frame attached to that, especially not 24 hours. Not to mention that the statute of limitations in Colorado for property damage is two years. <--I'll double check on that.

The insurance company WILL issue a Reservation of Rights letter on a claim they suspect of being fraudulent, especially if it is being filed after a suspiciously long period of time. Basically, if insurance companies started denying claims that weren't filed within 24 hours of the loss, they'd rack up so many bad faith lawsuits that they'd go out of business in a year.

[MarkCO]

Iriving, you are correct, 2 years for property and 3 years for medical.

The proof of insurance document often has the time limit for reporting on it. Mine says 24 hours, but I am sure other policies have differing timeframes.

As for wtiness statements, they do vary. I find the original statment often has the best facts, if not a bit disorganized. The recorded statement to the adjuster, a bit more organized, but more prone to error. The deposition is usually concise, but can be full or errors. What do I mean by "error"? Statements that are in contrast with the physical evidence.

See, I don't care who is at fault, I care about proving what acutally happened. So each witness statement is a piece of documentary evidence that must be weighed against the physical evidence. Yes, when the witness statements differ, that creates a problem for someone, but not me. Also, witness statements that differ with the physical evidence are "in error", not proof of a lie. People process and re-process the same events through a variety of filters, emotions and viewpoints. I clearly see drift over time in witness statements and that actually helps me understand the processing that each person applies. So, as a reconstructionist that deals with the phyiscal evidence as facts and the witness statements as potentail corroboration, I want as many witness statements as I can get. Somewhere in that mess of filters and emotion there are usually nuggets of truth.

[Gunner]

I got rearended by a American Family driver on Wednesday. I was stopped waiting to merge he then hit us from behind. Said his foot slipped off the brake. I took all his info and only gave him my name and cell number. I talked to the adjuster that day they took 100% of the responsibility. Guess it all depends on the situation

[Irving]

It is pretty uncommon to have a stopped vehicle that was rear-ended be at fault for anything.

MarkCo, do you ever recreate accidents that do not have injuries involved?

[MarkCO]

It is pretty uncommon to have a stopped vehicle that was rear-ended be at fault for anything.

MarkCo, do you ever recreate accidents that do not have injuries involved?

I do reconstructions and analysis of accidents with and without injuries, both on a regular basis. Low speed minor property damage auto-accidents are the least common for me since the fees make invovlement by someone like me a little cost prohibitive.

[Irving]

I think you might have called me about 6 years ago to ask if I could make a statement about an auto accident I saw back when I was delivering pizzas in Wheat Ridge. By the time you (or whoever it was) had called, I was a claims adjuster and you made the comment that the person suing would probably not give me a call once they found out my job. I never heard anything from anyone about that accident again.