Subrogation and How It Affects You
Subrogation is a term that's understood among insurance and legal firms but sometimes not by the policyholders they represent. Even if it sounds complicated, it is to your advantage to comprehend the nuances of how it works. The more you know about it, the more likely it is that an insurance lawsuit will work out favorably.
An insurance policy you own is an assurance that, if something bad happens to you, the business that insures the policy will make restitutions in one way or another without unreasonable delay. If a hailstorm damages your property, for instance, your property insurance agrees to remunerate you or enable the repairs, subject to state property damage laws.
But since determining who is financially responsible for services or repairs is typically a tedious, lengthy affair – and time spent waiting in some cases adds to the damage to the victim – insurance firms often decide to pay up front and figure out the blame after the fact. They then need a method to recover the costs if, ultimately, they weren't responsible for the expense.
For Example
You head to the doctor's office with a deeply cut finger. You give the receptionist your medical insurance card and he writes down your policy details. You get taken care of and your insurance company gets a bill for the tab. But on the following day, when you clock in at your workplace – where the accident happened – you are given workers compensation forms to file. Your workers comp policy is actually responsible for the hospital trip, not your medical insurance policy. The latter has a right to recover its costs somehow.
How Subrogation Works
This is where subrogation comes in. It is the process that an insurance company uses to claim payment when it pays out a claim that turned out not to be its responsibility. Some companies have in-house property damage lawyers and personal injury attorneys, or a department dedicated to subrogation; others contract with a law firm. Under ordinary circumstances, only you can sue for damages to your person or property. But under subrogation law, your insurance company is given some of your rights in exchange for having taken care of the damages. It can go after the money originally due to you, because it has covered the amount already.
How Does This Affect Me?
For starters, if you have a deductible, it wasn't just your insurance company that had to pay. In a $10,000 accident with a $1,000 deductible, you have a stake in the outcome as well – to be precise, $1,000. If your insurance company is lax about bringing subrogation cases to court, it might opt to get back its losses by raising your premiums and call it a day. On the other hand, if it has a capable legal team and goes after them enthusiastically, it is acting both in its own interests and in yours. If all is recovered, you will get your full $1,000 deductible back. If it recovers half (for instance, in a case where you are found one-half to blame), you'll typically get $500 back, depending on the laws in your state.
In addition, if the total cost of an accident is over your maximum coverage amount, you could be in for a stiff bill. If your insurance company or its property damage lawyers, such as Lawyers for Car Accidents Marietta GA, pursue subrogation and succeeds, it will recover your losses as well as its own.
All insurers are not created equal. When comparing, it's worth weighing the records of competing firms to find out whether they pursue winnable subrogation claims; if they do so fast; if they keep their clients posted as the case continues; and if they then process successfully won reimbursements right away so that you can get your deductible back and move on with your life. If, on the other hand, an insurance agency has a reputation of honoring claims that aren't its responsibility and then covering its income by raising your premiums, you should keep looking.
Lawyers for Car Accidents Marietta GA