How Personal Injury Claims Can Impact Your Auto Insurance

When an insurance company works out the costs for auto insurance, whether it be for cars, bikes, or other motorized vehicle, there are so many factors that they assess. This makes it hard to pinpoint exactly what will have more of an effect than something else.

There is a common idea that if you claim for an injury sustained in a car crash, your insurance premiums will increase exponentially thanks to a claim ‘blackmarking’ your record. While it is true that claims experience is something that is assessed when evaluating how much your premium will cost, it is not the be all and end all of the cost of your insurance.

How Insurance Companies Work

At the end of the day, insurance companies are a business and they need to make a profit in order to survive. To make sure they do not suffer any adverse effects from claims against their customers, they must predict the coming year and estimate the amount of money they will have to pay out to people who win their claims.

So with this in mind, it’s important to remember that insurance companies are looking at how risky a person is as a driver. The more risky the driver is, the more money they may have to pay out.

This is why your insurance premium may increase if someone makes a personal injury claim against you, but you may be safe if it is you who is making a claim.

Making a Personal Injury Claim

Nobody enjoys being in an auto incident, but if you are, make sure you turn to a reputable law firm like Dolan Law Firm PC. Based in San Francisco and with an office across the bay in Oakland, they’re one of the most successful personal injury lawyers in California.

As was mentioned earlier, if it is you making the claim against another party, you have a lower risk of having the cost of insurance increase. However, there are still instances where your premiums can go up.

If part of the claim involves repairs to your vehicle, even if the incident wasn’t your fault, your insurer may consider you as a higher risk driver, and more likely to have an accident again in the future.

You are also likely to have to pay the excess on your policy for the repairs to your vehicle, which is an additional cost that isn’t often included when you make a personal injury claim.

Independently Making a Claim

When you make a claim independently, for instance through a personal injury law firm (you can run by this link to find a firm similar to the one in need), the lawyers only deal with the insurer of the at-fault driver. This means that your non-claims bonus is not affected and you won’t have to pay the excess on your insurance.

Making a claim independently of your insurer allows you to get the same service, regardless of the type of coverage that you have and the vehicle that you drive.

It’s also useful to note that many injury lawyers now tend to offer a ‘no win, no fee’ policy, so if your case proves unsuccessful, you won’t have to pay for the services of the law firm.