Boston Car Accident Lawyer Blog
Filing a claim for personal injury damages following a car accident in Massachusetts is a somewhat complicated process compared to other states in the country. If you’ve been injured in a car accident where someone else was at fault, it is vital to contact a personal injury attorney from Altman & Altman LLP as soon as possible – and at a minimum, within three years of the incident – in order for your claim to go through the legal process necessary to decide if you will receive compensation.
The complexity of our state’s auto accident claims process is partially because Massachusetts is a “no-fault” state, meaning a driver who causes injuries through an accident must cover any injuries that other individuals sustained – whether another driver, their passengers or a third party such as a bicyclist – through their own personal injury policy, and a lawsuit cannot be filed for personal damages unless other certain criteria are met.
In the case of injuries where more than $2,000-worth of personal injuries are incurred, or where the damages from a car accident cause permanent or disfiguring injuries, such as serious scars or severely broken bones, the no-fault provision of law can be subverted and a personal injury claim may be filed to compensate the victim for their medical bills and damages incurred from pain and suffering or time missed from work.
How is fault assessed in Massachusetts?
After an accident, during the claims process it will be assessed who is at fault for the accident and to what degree that party was to blame for the accident. If you are attempting to file a personal injury claim that goes beyond the other motorist’s personal injury insurance, you will need to demonstrate that you were no more than 50 percent to blame for the accident.
Assessing this percentage of guilt is also by no means a straightforward process, and you have a much better chance at demonstrating you weren’t at fault if you have an experience car accident attorney in your corner advocating on your behalf.
Insurance complexities
Massachusetts requires certain types of insurance for everybody that operates a motor vehicle in the state. This includes insurance coverage up to $20,000 for bodily damage to each person and $40,000 per accident; $8,000 in personal injury protection; $20,000 per uninsured person involved, up to $40,000 per accident; and a minimum of $5,000 for personal property damage.
What these insurance requirements are intended to do is set a bar for coverage that must be met prior to any additional lawsuits to be allowed. However, it is also important to note that not everybody has proper insurance coverage despite it being law to do so. In these instances, filing a personal injury claim may be the only way to obtain necessary compensation that is owed to you following an accident.
Then there are the situations where an insurance company denies a claim that you believe to be legitimate. In such cases, you may wish to fight the claim denial or follow up with a personal suit against the driver who caused the accident. No matter the situation, the experienced attorneys at Altman & Altman LLP can help you towards a successful outcome.
Altman & Altman LLP has the experience to help no matter what the situation
The time immediately following a vehicular accident in Massachusetts is crucial. Within five days, accidents that cause more than $1,000 in property damage or cause a fatality must be reported. It is also during this time that the claims process will begin, and having an experienced auto accident attorney on your side will be especially important.
Our attorneys have over 50 years of experience navigating the complexities of Massachusetts auto insurance law, and have helped thousands of clients towards satisfactory results over the years following auto accidents.
Contact us online or call for a free consultation to go over the details of your case today at 617-492-3000 or toll-free at 800-481-6199. We are available 24/7.
