Smart accident victims try to maximize the compensation offered for any serious injury. However, there are a few tasks to be completed by any victims that have sustained a serious injury. Personal Injury Lawyer in Apple Valley will ask you to be prepared to show the nature and extent of the injurious harm done to your body.
You need to gather as much good evidence as possible. Good evidence helps to increase the size of the negotiated settlement.
Questions asked by adjuster, while seeking to determine a given injury’s value
• What did it cost to have the injury diagnosed and treated?
• Does the injury show up in an x-ray? An x-ray or imaging test aids detection for most of the more serious injuries.
• Must a physician rely on comments from the patient, in order to assess injury’s true nature? Complaints about a pain are a doctor’s only clue to the existence of a sprain or strain.
• Must an invasive procedure be used, in order to fix the patient’s damaged tissues? Those costs more than a simpler procedure.
What do the answers reveal about the extent of the victim’s injury?
If each question has a positive answer, then, that would suggest that the victim’s injuries are serious.
In order to assign a numerical value to a decidedly harmful injury, an adjuster uses a formula.
—The cost for repairing the injury gets multiplied by a number that the adjuster has selected. That number is called a multiplier.
—The multiplier normally falls between 1.5 and 5. It could be greater than 5, if the victim has suffered catastrophic injuries.
—The product of the multiplication operation gets added to the size of the victim’s lost wages.
—The result from the operation that calls for addition provides the adjuster with a figure to work with, during the settlement negotiations.
How does the adjuster make use of the figure that was obtained by using the formula?
The adjuster shows that same figure to his or her supervisor. The supervisor suggests what percent of that particular figure ought to be used as the starting offer for the expected negotiations.
The supervisor might also tell the adjuster about the existence of legal counsel for the victim. Smart victims retain the services of a lawyer. Those in the insurance industry know that a lawyer would be apt to question the reason for presentation of an especially low bid, at the initial stages of the negotiations.
Still, that initial offer is certain to be less than the amount demanded by the victim. Hence, the two sides exchange offers and counter-offers until both of them agree to accept some offer or counter-offer. At that point, the insurance company should promise delivery of a suitable compensation, one of a size that the other side had agreed to accept.