When Should I Lawyer-Up for Personal Injury Cases?

 
Each situation will demonstrate the importance of legal help to assist you in the complication of your matter and achieve a positive outcome.

Serious or Long-Term Injuries

The financial and emotional cost rises tremendously once an injury surpasses a few cuts and bruises. Severe injuries will usually involve multiple surgeries, rehabilitation, and care, which results in a mountain of medical bills that may feel like it will trap you for years.

 
You, the injured party, may be out of work for months or may never return to work again and earn a paycheck, leading to even more lost wages. Insurance companies may respond with an offer of settlement in a timely fashion, thinking it is generous, but never factor into the future, such as treatment for therapy or even adaptive equipment.

A lawyer calculates the total cost by including the bill right in front of you and the loss of future earning capacity and enjoyment of life. The experienced Phoenix personal injury attorneys at Zanes Law will be positioned to provide the answer to you for a settlement and review treatment options you may otherwise need to recover quickly and financially in the future.

Denied or Disputed Claim

Insurance companies do everything they can to reduce or deny payouts, and they are good at it. If the wrongful party's insurance company disputes or denies your claim outright, you will fight with your hands.

 
The wrongful party's insurance company could say you are at fault in part, they could exaggerate your pre-existing condition, or they could say the accident did not happen the way you said that it happened. These evasive maneuvers can frustrate you and leave you empty pockets when you may already be dealing with past medical payments or lost wages.

 
A personal injury attorney knows how to deal with being stonewalled. They will investigate the accident, keep the police report and witness statements, and, if necessary, engage an expert to set the scene to address the dispute.
If the negotiation is not going well, an attorney is ready to move to a lawsuit to get the insurance company's attention. If you go it alone, you allow the insurance company to bully you into dropping the claim. An attorney balances the process and pressures the insurance company to provide you with validity on your side of the situation.

Insufficient Settlement Proposals

After an accident, insurance companies will usually rush to make settlement propositions, which appear to be a blessing - especially if you have been inundated with medical bills. Yet these initial offers are seldom fair to you.

They may only take care of a small portion of your medical bills and ignore indices like lost wages, medically required services, and non-physical pain and suffering. If you rush to accept an offer, you might feel satisfied, but it might not pay you in the end with any of the needed financial recovery, and there is no changing your mind later.

A personal injury attorney assesses the offer and the matter related to the entirety of your damages. They will pursue all of your medical information, confer with specialists, and make future projections in terms of cost so it is clear what you are owed. If the initial offer does not address those issues, they will advocate aggressively to negotiate or file a lawsuit if all else fails.

Complex Liability Issues

The alleged bad guy is not always easy to find in personal injury matters. Multi-car pile ups, construction site incidents, or injuries that result from a defective product can involve more than two parties - all trying to shift the blame.

 
A simple car crash could involve a reckless driver, a poorly maintained roadway, and the defective part of a vehicle.
Determining who is liable is an inquiry into the facts and circumstances that sort into a tangled mess of information and evidence. And, if you are involved in a shared fault situation, many states reduce your recovery based on your percentage of fault, making liability very important.

 
An attorney will have the resources to thoroughly investigate all avenues, discover every party responsible for your injury, and hold all those parties accountable.

Endnote

You're not hiring a lawyer to jump into battle. You're hiring a lawyer to make wise decisions. Getting legal help early helps you preserve evidence, adhere to deadlines, and, most importantly, avoid traps (e.g., signing documents that waive your rights).

 
Most personal injury lawyers will work on a contingency basis - you do not pay anything upfront, and they only get paid if you prevail. This makes it a no-brainer to consult with a lawyer when these triggers come into play. If you wait too long, you will not be able to strengthen your case or be stuck with a bad deal.