Automobile Accidents

Our firm represents clients who have suffered personal injuries or property damage in automobile, motorcycle or truck accidents in the Dallas/Fort Worth and North Texas area. We are a full service firm with experienced personnel who have worked for and against the insurance companies.  We know how to maximize your recovery from the insurance company you are dealing with. 

We will get your money for you as fast as possible.  We know how financially devastating an automobile accident can be.  You need reimbursement and need it fast to pay your bills.  We will obtain your money for you as quickly as possible. 
                           
Dealing with the Insurance Company:
Typically an insurance company will try to lull you into a false sense of security, and then lower the boom on you weeks or even months later when they tell you that they will not cover your loss.  Do not be a victim twice.  The person they insured caused the accident (your first time as a victim), don’t let their insurance company victimize you again by trying to convince you that you don’t need an attorney when you have been injured in an accident. 

Insurance companies make millions of dollars each year by convincing people that they will take care of all their needs.  What happens next is when you try to get your claim settled, and receive payment for your medical bills, your lost income, your towing bills, your rental car bills, your total loss on your vehicle, and your pain and suffering, the insurance company denies responsibility, and tells you that they never actually guaranteed any type of payment.  This is usually true, they craft their words in such a way as to try to gain your confidence (ie. “We will take care of you”, “Your claim is in good hands”, “You have no need to worry, we have everything under control”, etc.), but not make any guarantee that they will pay you a dime . . . listen to their words carefully.  Ask them if they will guarantee they will pay your injury claim and all your medical bills and ask them to put that in writing, see what their response is.  You will not be impressed by their response. 

Your injuries:
You have been injured by the automobile accident, what do you need to do next?
    1) Get the names, addresses, and phone numbers of all the witnesses as soon as possible, and SAVE THEM. 
    People like to justify their behavior after the fact.  They think “I’m a good person, surely I didn’t run that red light”, and then that becomes their story to their insurance company, that they didn’t run the red light . . . the other person must have run it.  They may have admitted everything to you at the scene, but later on, when they have had the time to think of justifications for their actions, they will make up excuses, or will totally make up a new way the accident happened. 
    Usually, its pretty easy to see who is lying. The liar will usually just go through his/her own insurance to get their vehicle fixed, and will typically not even bother to try getting their vehicle fixed through the other person’s insurance, because they KNOW what the truth is.   They know the other insurance company won’t pay them, because they know what the other person has already told the insurance company about what happened.
    Additionally, if you are involved in an accident with a commercial vehicle (someone who drives for a living), they will ALWAYS deny responsibility, regardless of how obvious it is that they are responsible.  They will lose their job if they have too many accidents charged against them, therefor there is a built-in reason to lie . . . to save his/her job.  
    Gather your witnesses, and keep their information safe and current. 
    2) Take photographs of vehicles.
    Take photographs at the scene of the accident if you can (use your cell-phone camera if necessary).  A picture speaks a thousand words, as the old saying goes.  A day later or more, the debris will be cleaned up, skid marks will fade, the vehicles will no longer be in the same resting position.  The person who caused the accident may have their vehicle fixed the very next day, and you lose valuable evidence of what the damage to their vehicle looked like.  You may need these photos to prove how the accident happened, or to prove how severe the accident was. 
    If you can’t take pictures at the scene, see if someone else can.  If not, then take pictures of your car as soon as possible at the body shop, or at your home, or where ever it is located. 
    Take pictures that actually SHOW the damage.  Believe it or not, the insurance company will take pictures to try to show that there is minor or no damage.  They will take pictures in lighting or angles where the damage is obscured by the angle of the photo, or by shadows. 
    Why would they do that?    Because insurance companies know that if they can show a jury that your car had little or no damage, that they can convince that jury that the impact was so minor that nobody should have been hurt in that accident (they make this argument whether its true or not). 
    You say, “I’m not suing anyone, I just want to make a claim to get my car fixed and get my medical bills paid”.  Well, I’m not suggesting you need to sue on every single claim either.  But insurance companies put a value on their claims based on what juries are doing, and what they think they could convince a jury of.  So the picture that they take, showing little or no damage, causes the value of your claim to shrink.  You have to take pictures that actually show the damage, and how severe it is, and where.  Don’t think the insurance company will do this for you.  They will do just the opposite.  It is quite common today for insurance companies to offer people LESS than their medical bills when they think they can make an argument that the damage is so minor the person should not have been hurt.  So protect yourself against insurers. 
    3.  Take photographs of bruising, cuts, injuries. 
    If you have any bruising, cuts, injuries that are visible, take pictures of those injuries.  Its hard to argue someone was not injured with a picture of a huge black and blue bruise, and/or cuts. Bruises and cuts go away, and if you don’t take a picture, the insurance company won’t believe you when you tell them you had cuts and bruises (or will pretend they don’t believe you).
    4.  Get your own estimate of your vehicle.
    Several body-shops will give you a free estimate.  Have your own estimate done.  Insurance companies will often write an estimate for less than half what the damage really will cost to repair.  To protect yourself, get your own estimate.  Let the insurance company do their estimate as well, but be armed with your own in case they try to short-change you.  I have often seen insurance companies write estimates for $600.00 when the damage was in reality over $3000.00.  Protect yourself against insurers. 
    5.  If you are injured or feeling pain/discomfort in any way, see a doctor immediately.
    After an accident, people often feel discomfort and pain, but its not severe enough to go to the emergency room.  Many times it will go away in a day or two.  Many times it won’t.
    If you are having any pain or discomfort, seek medical treatment as soon as possible.  Why? Because if you don’t, you are giving the insurance company ammunition to use against you later.  If it does turn out that you have an injury that starts out slowly, but gets worse over time, you will be at a huge disadvantage if you don’t seek medical treatment in a reasonably short time. 
    The insurance company will argue 1) that if you were really injured, you would have sought treatment right away, and/or 2) if you wait a couple weeks to seek treatment (waiting on the pain to go away, but it never does), they will argue that “something else” must have happened, and now you are trying to blame it on the automobile accident, and/or 3) sometimes they will lead you to believe that they will provide you with a doctor to see, but never do.  Then you push them on the issue, and they deny they ever led you to believe that (thus causing you to wait 2-4 weeks to see a doctor because you thought they were going to provide you with information on one to see).  Then they use the arguments in 1 and 2 above (that you weren’t really injured or else you would have seen a doctor or “something else” must have happened and you are trying to blame it on the accident). 
    6.  Save all documents showing what you are out of pocket. 
    Save all towing bills, rental bills, storage fees, prescription fees, doctor bills, everything.  If you want a full recovery, you have to provide a full record.  Save everything. 
    7.  Call the police to the scene, order a police report.
    In some cities, police won’t come to an accident scene unless someone is hurt.  If you are feeling any discomfort or pain, you are hurt.  You might not need to go to the emergency room, but you are hurt if you are in pain or discomfort after an accident.  Advise the dispatcher that there is an injury in these circumstances.  You need a report taken, and a record of what happened. 
    Often times people change their story after you leave the scene of the accident.  If there is no police report, and no witnesses, then you have no proof that you are the one telling the truth.  It turns into a swearing match, which makes recovery from the insurance company much more difficult.  If a police officer comes to the scene, usually the person will admit fault because he/she is in shock from the accident, and hasn’t had time to think up a lie about how it happened.  The officer will write into the report that the person admitted fault, and that is admissible at trial.  So protect yourself, and insist on a police officer to make a report if at all possible.  Then order the police report and verify that it is correct. 
    Sometimes officers transpose numbers or directions when writing the report (they usually write them later in the day from the notes they took at the scene).  If you don’t check the report soon after the accident, you won’t be able to get the officer to correct it, because he will forget what happened after a period of time and may possibly lose his handwritten notes.  Check the report as soon as possible after the accident, and get any corrections done as soon as possible by contacting the officer and advising of any problems with the report. 
    8.  Contact an attorney as soon as possible.
    If you do not work as an attorney, or for an attorney, or as a claims adjuster, you do not know how to handle an insurance claim.  There are thousands of possibilities of what you will need to do and how you will need to handle different situations.  You need to hire someone with experience handling automobile accident claims.  Someone who will not mess up your claim, and someone who will maximize the benefits you are entitled to receive.  Call me immediately for a free consultation. 
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Our firm represents clients who have suffered personal injuries or property damage in automobile, motorcycle or truck accidents in the Dallas / North Texas area. Such motor vehicle accidents include those involving drunk or hit and run drivers, uninsured or underinsured drivers, as well as accidents occurring from motor vehicle, SUV and semi-tractor trailer collisions and rollovers.

We also represent those injured in car accidents, collisions or crashes.

If you or someone you know has been injured in a motor vehicle accident or car crash, CONTACT US ONLINE OR CALL US AT (972) 599 4100 TO SET UP A FREE CONSULTATION.