Last time I lend out my truck... - Page 2 (2024)

Mr.E.G.

Join Date: Apr 2007

Location: Texas

Posts: 2,960

Get Allstate. Seriously (in Texas, at least). The firm I work for does not even take cases involving Allstate any more since they will refuse compensation on any bodily injury claim, irrespective of merit, forcing unnecessary litigation.

If that's what you want in a carrier, then they exist. However, this is playing with fire. Under Texas law (most states have a similar provision) if a carrier does not act in a reasonably prudent manner and attempt to resolve a valid claim in good faith, they expose their insured to unnecessary liability (the very liability for which the policy exists to shield the insured from). As such, when the case needlessly goes to trial and the defendant/ insured gets their ass handed to them, the insured is liable for the excess judgment. In other words, if your carrier plays by the rules and they recognize that they are protecting you by paying off valid claims (when the claimant takes the money, they release you from further liability), the limit of your exposure is the limits of your policy. So if you have $100k in liability insurance and you caused $200k in injuries, the injured party has to decide whether they want to forgo the insurance policy (fat chance) and sue you directly or whether they'd like to accept the insurance policy and settle for less than the fair market value of the claim. Well, if your carrier recognizes that there is a valid claim worth $200k and they decide to roll dice with your financial security and future and they then refuse to act in good faith, the injured party can take the case to trial and get a judgment for the full $200k and you are liable for anything above the insurance policy limits. As impractical as it is for an injured party to expect a settlement out of your personal assets (most people don't have enough personal assets to offer a settlement worth considering) it is pretty stinking practical to enforce a judgment obtained in court. Thus, a carrier who arbitrarily refuses to settle and forces unnecessary litigation is putting you in harm's way.

I'm entirely sympathetic to your situation. You didn't cause the accident, but surely you can see why you are financially responsible, right? You lent your vehicle to someone who acted in a reckless fashion. Did he commit a crime against humanity? No. Did his actions amount to genocide or mass casualties? No. But he committed an act of negligence that caused (entirely or at least partially) someone to incur damages and he did it with your vehicle.

As a consequence of all this, you are now inclined not to lend your vehicle to other people. Gee. It's almost like the intent of laws that hold you financially accountable for lending your car to people exist to discourage the act of entrusting a machine capable of causing harm to people that you are anything less than 100% certain will exercise proper care. Go figure.

As to your comments about your carrier paying her a few thousand dollars to go away... If you're referring to the amount to fix her car, I'd hardly say that warrants your frustration. She seems perfectly entitled to have her car fixed. If you are insinuating that she will be given a few thousand dollars to settle a fake injury claim, I seriously doubt that will be the case. Every bodily injury claim has to be substantiated with medical records and so forth. If she has medical records that are the result of the accident, then that may be the case. But, if as you suspect, her injuries are not genuine and she has no such documentation showing that she sustained an injury, your carrier may indeed pay her some money to bug off but it's not going to more than a few hundred dollars.

You guys seem to have some serious misgivings about the leverage that a person who has marginal or even phony injuries can exert over an insurance carrier. The common explanation provided with such theories is that insurance carriers are willing to cave in order to avoid costly litigation? Umm, what costly litigation is likely to come to fruition from a claim for bodily injury that is worth a couple of grand? Let's assume this lady has a perfectly legit (in terms of liability) but minor injury (it seems unlikely to me that she was actually injured, but this is a hypothetical) and she submits medical bills for a check up and asks for some pain and suffering compensation. What do you think that is worth? Realistically, it's a claim that is worth only a few thousand dollars on her best day. Why would the insurance carrier then pay her what she'd get on her best day to settle (HINT: The root word of settlement is freaking settle, LOL). If the insurance company tells her to shove off and they offer her a settlement amount equivalent to 25% of what she'd get on her best day, what leverage does she have to compel them otherwise? Do you think that a lawyer is going to lift a finger on a claim that measly in which there has already been an offer made by the carrier? No way. Do you think that the carrier is going to fret the prospects of being crucified in court by a pro se litigant? No way.

I'll be the first to admit that when a case has major damages and the liability of the defendant is ambiguous that a law firm is likely to at least take the case on and do some investigation into the matter. We take at least 50 would-be wrongful death cases a year where we look into it and then withdraw once we learn that the claim has no merit (hell, many of the 50 SHOULD have merit but some BS law shields a legitimately liable defendant enough that we can't pursue them). There are major damages so it's worth taking a look. But at the end of the day we can't simply sue someone because of a significant loss. There obviously must also be good reason to suspect that the defendant is responsible for the loss or the case will get thrown out ten different ways.

But when a case has a good liability fact pattern but the damages are insignificant, no lawyer is going to ever be able to justify fighting that uphill battle. The simple fact of the matter is that most claimants are woefully ignorant about the law and the insurance carrier is holding all the cards. They understand the law to a greater extent, they have considerable resources at their disposal, and they have engineered a liability claims process that is designed to give them the upper hand. As such, most people who attempt to work out the claim with the carrier (even valid claims) end up getting the short end of the stick.

All told, I find it very hard to imagine that your carrier is going to give her a significant amount of money just to not be bothered by her. Why would they? Are they willing to give her some amount of money to "go away?" Sure. A couple grand? Not unless she can substantiate her damages with medical bills. You guys act like insurance carriers have never encountered opportunistic plaintiffs or bogus claims before. Think it through, fellas.

Again though, if you're frustrated by the aggregate amount that your carrier will pay her including the cost of repairing her vehicle, then you're misplacing your frustration. Just because you feel some portion of her claim is fishy, that does not mean that the whole thing is.

Lastly, you mentioned that your buddy whom you lent the truck to will pay your deductible. What's that all about? Unless your state has some goofy laws, you don't pay a deductible for a liability claim.