Were you hit by a vehicle while walking and have questions about what to do after a pedestrian accident injury? Contact our Kansas attorneys.
1) Choose the Right Attorney
We got a call from someone the other day who was injured in a pedestrian accident. She had a good question, and that was how to choose an attorney that’s best for her. In choosing an attorney to handle a pedestrian accident claim, you want to make sure that you find someone that is focused on handling these types of cases and their core focus is injury cases and in particular pedestrian injury cases. You don’t want to hire somebody who handles a little bit of everything, the attorney that you know that handles divorces and wills and traffic tickets and those kinds of things. You want to find an attorney that’s core focus is on personal injury and in particular pedestrian injury accident.
You also want to find somebody that has experience and success in handling these types of cases. They will know how to work up your case. They will know how to present the case to the insurance carrier to get the insurance carrier to pay a fair and reasonable amount for your injuries. Most importantly, another thing you want to make sure you look for is a trial attorney. Not all attorneys are trial attorneys. Trial attorneys are attorneys who are experienced in taking cases to trial.
Not all attorneys are willing to take a case or even capable of taking a case to trial, so you want to make sure you find someone that is able to take your case to trial if the insurance carrier’s not willing to pay a fair and reasonable amount for your injuries. A trial attorney will work your case up from the beginning with the intention of taking it to trial if that’s necessary. Make sure you find somebody that is an experienced trial attorney to help you with your pedestrian accident case. If you have any questions about your pedestrian accident case, give us a call. We’d be happy to answer those questions for you.
2) Avoid These Mistakes
We talked to someone recently who’d been injured in a pedestrian accident case, and unfortunately, they made some mistakes that we see a lot of people make in this situation. For one, this person didn’t gather all the evidence that they could there from the scene. It’s important to make sure that you collect all the evidence that you can, you take photographs, that you collect witness statements or at least contact information right away there at the scene, or if you’re not in a position to do that that you hire an attorney right away that can do that for you. The more time that goes by, the more evidence is lost. Things change, and witnesses forget what they saw or change the story from what they told you there at the scene, so you want to make sure that you gather the evidence right away.
Another common mistake t is that they don’t go get the treatment that they need. People will oftentimes wait to get treatment thinking that they’ll get better from their injuries, and they won’t need to go to the doctor, and then two, three, four weeks down the road, they’re still having problems. It’s important to get in to see your doctor right away so that you can make sure you’re getting the treatment that you need and get started on that treatment right away and also to make sure that your injuries are well-documented. If you wait too long to go to the doctor, the insurance carrier will use that delay in getting treatment as an excuse to delay or maybe deny your case entirely.
Another mistake people make is that they will give statements to the insurance company without the assistance of an attorney. That’s a huge mistake. You do not want to give a statement to the insurance carrier. The insurance carrier’s sole focus in obtaining a statement from you is to gather evidence that will help them delay or deny your claim. Even though you feel like you’re going to tell the truth, what harm could there be in talking to the insurance carrier, the insurance carrier is skilled at getting information, asking questions in a certain way, maybe asking the questions in a certain order that will be detrimental to your case.
Probably one of the biggest, most common mistakes we see is people hire the wrong attorney to represent them. You want to make sure that you have an attorney that understands this area of the law, that has experience and success in handling these types of cases and is willing to take your case to trial if that’s what’s necessary to get the best recovery for you. Don’t make these common mistakes. Hire an attorney early and quickly and hire the right attorney. If you have any questions about hiring an attorney or any other aspects of your pedestrian accident claim, give us a call. We’d be happy to talk to you about it.
3) Who Pays the Bills?
We got a call the other day from someone who was injured in a pedestrian accident, and they wanted to know who was responsible for paying their medical bills from that accident. It’s a question we get a lot. The answer is that there are different insurance companies that are responsible for paying your medical bills, and oftentimes, there is an order to how those medical bills are paid and by which insurance company.
Initially, your medical bills will not be paid by the responsible party. If you have insurance on a vehicle in Kansas or are otherwise covered by what is called personal injury protection benefits or PIP coverage, your PIP coverage even as a pedestrian would cover your medical bills for your pedestrian accident injury. Once your personal injury protection benefits have been paid in full, then your health insurance will start paying your medical bills and pay your medical bills until you are done treating for that injury.
Once you are done treating, all of your medical bills, including those paid by your personal injury protection as well as your health insurance, will be submitted to the insurance carrier for the responsible party, and that insurance carrier will pay those medical bills, but they don’t pay those bills up front. They pay those bills after you’re done getting the treatment that you need. In can be difficult to navigate which insurance company is supposed to pay at which time. We can help you with all of that and make sure that ultimately your medical bills are paid by the responsible party in the end. If you have any questions about getting your medical bills paid or any other aspects of your pedestrian accident claim, please give us a call. We’d be happy to talk to you about that.
4) Understand the Timeline
A lot of people who have been injured in a pedestrian accident in Kansas want to know how long it is going to take to resolve their case. That’s a good question, and it’s a question that is specific to and unique to every person individually. It’s impossible to give you an answer that applies to everyone. The important thing is that you focus on getting the treatment that you need and recover from your injuries. While you’re doing that, we will be working on your case and preparing your case and gathering all the evidence and having everything ready to go so that when your doctor says you are done with treatment, we will then present a demand to the insurance carrier to see if we can settle the case.
If the insurance carrier is willing to be fair and reasonable and pay the full extent of your damages, then we might be able to reach a settlement agreement quickly and get your case resolved pretty fast. If the insurance carrier is not willing to be fair and reasonable and pay you for the damages that you’ve incurred, then we might need to pursue your case further, file suit, and take your case to trial in front of a jury. Those steps will, of course, take more time, but regardless of how much time it takes, our goal is making sure we get the best recovery for you, and we will make sure that we do that even if that does require more time involved on the claim. If you have any questions about your pedestrian accident injury, give us a call. We’d be happy to answer your questions.
Were you or a loved one severely injured in a pedestrian accident in Kansas and have questions about what to do after a pedestrian accident injury? Contact our experienced Kansas pedestrian accident lawyers today for a free consultation and case evaluation.
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