What Do Injured Passengers Need To Do After A Car Wreck?
Being in a car wreck is bad enough, but being in a car wreck as someone's passenger can be a real disaster, especially if neither of the drivers involved in the crash wants to take responsibility for your losses.
What can you do? This can be an especially pressing question if you have injuries that need to be treated, doctors' bills that need to be paid, and other bills that are piling up because you're missing time from work while you recover. Here are the steps you can take to protect your interests:
Obtain Whatever Medical Care You Need
Your health is the number one priority in this situation, so don't hesitate to seek medical treatment for your injuries. If you have private insurance or the driver of the vehicle you were in has MedPay (the optional medical payment coverage that's available in most areas), that will cover the bulk of your medical bills for now.
Once there's an official determination of fault for the crash, the insurance company that pays your medical bills today can seek to recover their money from the at-fault party's insurance through a legal process known as subrogation.
File A Claim Against Both Drivers
Frankly, this isn't an issue that you have to sort out on your own, and you shouldn't try. The best way to protect your interests is to talk to a car accident attorney and learn what it takes to file a personal injury claim against both the driver of the other vehicle and the driver of the car you were riding in.
While it can be somewhat uncomfortable to file a car accident claim against your driver (who is probably also someone you know quite well), filing against both drivers is necessary because there are only three possibilities where liability is concerned:
- The driver of the car you were in caused the accident.
- The driver of the other car caused the accident.
- Both drivers share responsibility for the accident.
In two out of three scenarios, you have to seek compensation from the person who was driving the vehicle you were in if you want to recover your financial losses.
It may make you feel less awkward about filing your claims once you know that you aren't really suing your driver. Instead, you're asking their insurance company to honor its agreement to pay for any losses caused by their policyholder's mistakes.
Contact a local law firm to learn more, like Maxwell Law Firm.
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