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As a trucking lawyer, I am often faced with complex insurance coverage scenarios and today we will be discussing the difference between trucking and non-trucking coverage. In the industry, especially among smaller carriers, after dropping off a trailer, a driver will often have to head back to the depot without a trailer attached or he may use the bobtail tractor as personal transportation when not under dispatch. In the industry this is known as “bobtailing.” The situation can arise in a accident caused by a truck where the victim is struck by a tractor trailer running bobtail and in many situations a coverage fight can ensue.

If a truck accident in Georgia occurs because a bobtail truck strikes another vehicle, the trucking company will first want to analyze whose coverage is primary; the trucking or the non-trucking coverage. This is an important issue because in many cases the personality of the insurance company and the amounts of insurance coverage can differ. It is critical to resolve the coverage issue before the litigation goes too far because otherwise the insurance carriers will use the legal uncertainty as their reason for not paying full value on the case.

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Before I began practicing almost exclusively as an injury lawyer, I litigated business and contract cases throughout Georgia and represented Cobb County’s Department of Transportation in eminent domain cases. Many of my former Georgia clients call me with contract law problems years after their Atlanta injury cases are over and so I thought I would put down some contract law basics here as a resource.

Contracts are the fundamental basis of civilized society. It does not matter if two people make an agreement and shake hands in front of a peanut field or 50 people sign a 700 page contract in an overpriced law firm high above the streets of Atlanta; they are both contracts. Contracts can be oral in many circumstances but I tell all of my clients, if it’s not in writing, good luck proving it except through course of dealing. Here are some basic rules to follow:

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As an injury lawyer, I get numerous calls from people that have been in severe car accidents. Although their main focus is their medical condition, they inevitably want to know how to prevent the insurance company from cheating them on the value of their cars when they are totaled out in the car accident.The approach I suggest is as follows:

1) Make contact soon after the crash to accelerate the process. Do not give a recorded statement to the other driver’s company though.

2) Calculate the real market value of your car by pulling a value up on NADA’s Black Book value guide. Kelly Blue Book is not used as much in the insurance industry and NADA will give you a realistic idea of what to expect. Aim for the private party sales price, retail is harder to get.

Some inexperienced injury lawyers fail to thoroughly identify all of the Georgia Uninsured Motorist insurance coverage available to their client after a serious car accident. I have previously written here about the added on coverage that everyone should select as it stacks on top of the at fault driver’s coverage, but stacking is another issue that an injury lawyer should deal with as well.

If you have more than one insurance policy( as opposed to more than one car on the same policy) you can generally stack those Georgia Uninsured Motorist Insurance coverages together. Horace Mann Ins. Corp. v. Mercer, 257 Ga. App. 278, 570 S.E. 2d 589 (2002) For example, I have a client with different four State Farm policies and he is able to stack each of the $250,000.00 policies to provide a total of $1,000,000.00 in coverage for his wife’s permanent injury. That would not be true if the four cars were all insured on the same policy. You can also stack motor home policies, motorcycle policies and umbrella uninsured motorist policies.

The most common situation where this arises is with State Farm policies. State Farm issues a separate insurance policy for each car insured. The result is that if you have UM coverage, the policies can all stack, creating greater coverage.

A new client retained me today as their lawyer and we will be able to make a substantial and just recovery for them in their case against a tractor trailer company driver who turned across four lanes of traffic in Riverdale, Georgia, causing serious injuries. What shocked me was the recording on her cell phone from Georgia Medical and Legal services and two other lawyer services soliciting her business in the days after the crash. It is illegal for a lawyer to solicit your business with a cold call after a car wreck and only low end attorneys participate in this practice. Here is a good video that an acquaintance made documenting the background on these people.

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As a lawyer who handles car accident cases, I get this question a lot, so I will write a brief post on this here. Yes, your health insurance will pay for medical care incurred as a result of a car accident so long as 1) the non emergency care is in network, 2) you provide confirmation to your health insurer that you did not have Georgia medical payments insurance or it was exhausted, 3) you actually give the medical providers your health insurance information in a timely fashion. The bottom line is submit the bills to the health insurer and make sure you give the hospital your health insurance information up front or in the days following.

Will you have to reimburse your health insurance company in Georgia? Probably. The loopholes are getting smaller and smaller but it basically boils down to whether you are still insured with them and whether they are a self funded plan or not and whether the health insurance plan contains the correct wording for reimbursement.

There are three types of health insurance where we know that the client will usually be shielded by Georgia’s “made whole” law.

A very nice potential client called today looking for a Lawyer as he was not getting return phone calls from his injury lawyer. He described a collision in which the car sustained over $9,000.00 in damage and he said he had called a TV advertising firm to help with the case.The first problem is that the law firm charged him a 40% contingency fee for pre-suit work. The standard fee is 33.3% in Atlanta. Even worse, the firm also told this man to go to an Atlanta chiropractic clinic that they worked with often rather than to go to his own family doctor and to have it paid for by his health insurance. The client has health insurance and would have had access to cheaper and better health care but the lawyer diverted him to “their chiropractor.” To compound the problem, the chiropractor then sent the man to a local neurologist who is well known in the insurance defense community for having little credibility. Now the man has over $9,000.00 in flimsy medical bills that are unpaid and will have to come out of his settlement.

The client has wasted two months getting overpriced chiropractic care, he is on the hook for the bills because those kind of doctors do not take health insurance and the chiropractor and neurologist are looking to the settlement to get paid. The worst part is that the client has continuing low back pain and the low end medical care suggested by the lawyer is worthless. The client is now going to an orthopedist in his health care plan, but much of the damage is done.

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Twelve years ago I met my wife, Tyree Churchill Simon, on a blind date at Fado Fado in Buckhead and what I knew then is even more true now; she is the most beautiful woman in Atlanta. Thank you for 12 years, 2 cool kids and a hilarious and passionate life together.

Love, your husband,
Chris

Like many of you in the past, I got called for jury duty in Fulton County today and even though I am an Injury Lawyer, and wrote this is large bold Allcaps on the form, I still got to hang around until 6 p.m. waiting to be cut by the lawyers trying the case. No one puts a trial lawyer on a jury and I wish they would have done it this morning. However, some jurors wanted to know what to expect in the selection process for a trial so I thought I would put a few thoughts down for you so that your day is more enjoyable.

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Many clients come to me after being injured in a car accident in Georgia and they complain that their health insurance company is refusing to pay their bills claiming that it is a car accident and therefore the money has to come from the other driver.This is a lie being spread by the health insurance companies. It is a complex issue,but it breaks down this way. Your Georgia health insurance is obligated to pay for your medical care after a car crash so long as you presented the bill within the time allowed under the policy and so long as there is no medical payments coverage. If there is no medical payments coverage, your health insurance is the first payor and they must pay. That’s it.

I do advise my client that they do need to provide them with information about the driver that caused the crash and the health insurer may claim a right of reimbursement if you make a recovery for bills that they paid, but they have to pay.

Do be careful though because some hospitals will lie to you and claim that they submitted the bill and that the health insurer refused to pay. I find the best practice is to submit the bill yourself to the health insurer the minute you get it and to send a certified letter to your medical providers with your health care information attached as well as a letter from your own insurance company confirming that there are no medical payments benefits (usually in the form of a copy of your declarations page)