Will I Get Stuck Paying the Bills After a Wreck That’s Not My Fault?
You are driving home from work after a long day, someone runs a red light and T-Bone’s your car. The next thing you know you’re in an ambulance on your way to a local hospital where they run all kinds of expensive tests to make sure you don’t have any serious injuries. The following day you find out your bills are already over $15,000 and the other driver is uninsured. What do you do now?
Here at Rice and Kendig see hundreds of clients every year. More than a few are in collisions with people who either have no insurance or don’t have enough insurance to cover the first set of bills for the ambulance, hospital and doctors. The minimum financial limit in Louisiana is only $15,000 per person, $30,000 per collision no matter how many people are hurt.
How Can You Protect Your Family Before a Wreck Happens?
You should have Uninsured Motorist coverage. UM coverage, as it is known, protects you and your family when the other driver does not have any insurance, and also when the other driver doesn’t have enough insurance. UM coverage provides many additional benefits to you and your family:
- It protects you if you are in someone else’s car, the school bus and even if you are a pedestrian and the at fault car is uninsured or under insured.
- It protects you if you are in someone else’s car and the driver is at fault and does not have any or enough insurance.
- In some cases, your coverage can be added, or stacked on top of another UM policy to provide a second layer of UM coverage.
- It protects you if the at fault insurance company is or becomes bankrupt.
- UM, in some cases may pay for your medical expenses before the at fault party pays.
In our experience, many insurance sales agents do not encourage UM coverage. We have heard stories of agents telling our clients they don’t need UM coverage, because everyone is required to have liability insurance. In Louisiana 13% of drivers have no insurance at all. And according to Louisiana Insurance Commissioner, James Donelon, 40% of Louisiana’s drivers have only the minimum coverage. The bigger problem is that Louisiana’s low financial limits are just not keeping up with the high cost of medical care.
That means you and your family may be stuck with the medical bills, lost wages and other losses if there is not enough insurance.
The best way to protect your family from getting stuck with the bills in the event that your experience a car accident is to make sure you have UM coverage, before you have a wreck. We recommend everyone getting as much UM coverage as you have in liability coverage to protect yourself and your family.
But what if you don’t have UM coverage. Rice and Kendig can still help you solve the problems that come about following a car wreck. We can make sure every resource is made available to you and maximize your recovery, physically, emotionally and financially.
REFERENCES:
https://www.iii.org/fact-statistic/facts-statistics-uninsured-motorists
