Know Your Rights
When you suffer serious injury it may give rise to several different claims. The first is the claim against the party who caused the injury. The responsible party, however, does not typically step forward and offer to reimburse you for your damages. It is your obligation to affirmatively assert your claims. There are time limits when one must affirmatively assert their claim. When the responsible party is a governmental entity, that time frame is particularly short.
An injury caused by a third party may also give rise to a claim for benefits under one of your own insurance policies. This could include uninsured or underinsured motorist coverage, medical insurance, property insurance, and disability insurance if you are unable to return to work.
Finally, a serious injury may give rise to benefits under various governmentally mandated programs such as workers’ compensation, state disability, social security disability and victims of violent crimes.
Each of the potential avenues of recovery should be considered since from our perspective, no matter how much one recovers as compensation for an injury, it never makes one whole.