You should do everything possible to promote your recovery and enhance your case after a car accident. With this in mind, seeing a doctor and hiring a lawyer should be urgent priorities for every car accident survivor.
When you see a doctor, ensure they tend to all of your accident-related symptoms and provide diagnoses for your injuries. Find a law firm with a stellar track record in car accident cases at the soonest opportunity. Retain the Chicago car accident attorneys and let them start fighting for your financial recovery today.
What You Do After a Car Accident Matters—Follow These Steps
It’s a mistake to:
- Dismiss a car accident as a minor or routine event
- Assume that you are not injured because you aren’t currently suffering obvious symptoms
- Underplay abnormal health issues, like physical pain, and “toughing out” the effects of the accident
- Delay getting medical care or hiring a lawyer
- Assume that the insurance process will “just work out”
You need to be proactive when it comes to your health and securing the money you deserve after the accident. Steps you must take include:
Getting Medical Care
It’s always smart for car accident survivors to:
- Accept medical care at the accident scene (though that time may have passed)
- See a doctor as soon as possible after the collision
- Ask for any physical exams, medical imaging, and other procedures that can reveal injuries
- Request specific diagnoses from their doctor
- Ask for copies of any medical images, doctors’ notes, bills, and other documentation of their injuries and care
Car accidents can cause life-threatening injuries, yet those injuries (like brain trauma) sometimes take time to manifest symptoms. Getting immediate medical care will protect your health and will also be key to the success of any claim or lawsuit your lawyer is handling.
Finding a Highly Qualified, Experienced Attorney to Lead Your Case
Finding a lawyer is nearly as important as getting medical care for many reasons. Your lawyer will fight for fair compensation, which will afford you financial security after the accident. This is critical because if you do not obtain the money you deserve, you may:
- Be unable to afford the healthcare you need
- Struggle to heal from injuries due to the stress of financial insecurity
- Suffer psychologically and emotionally because of financial strain, lack of access to mental health services, and the other consequences of being underpaid for a car accident
Attorneys have many resources, relevant case experience, and the ability to file a lawsuit on your behalf. This makes a car accident lawyer highly qualified to fight for you.
Seeking Help for Your Mental Health
Car accident victims often deal with post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and many other forms of pain and suffering. You deserve fair compensation for these conditions, and you need to document them. This is why you may:
- See a mental health service provider as soon as possible after the car accident
- Explain the psychological and emotional challenges you’ve endured since the accident
- Ask for as specific diagnoses as possible
- Request documentation of all diagnoses and the cost of your care
Once you hire a car accident lawyer, they will ensure you get all the care you need. They will contact your medical providers and mental health professionals and get any documentation you don’t already have.
A Car Accident Lawyer Will Take Several Critical Steps for You (Fighting for the Money You Deserve)
As you take the steps you must take after the accident—namely, getting the care you need—your lawyer will be taking steps to complete your case successfully. These steps may include:
Reporting to the Accident Scene (And, Even If They Don’t, Securing All Relevant Evidence)
Securing evidence is one of your lawyer’s most pressing priorities. If circumstances allow, your lawyer will visit your accident scene and obtain the following:
- Eyewitness testimony about how the accident happened
- Any photographs and videos that are relevant to your case
- Any police report detailing the accident
- Any other evidence that may help your lawyer prove fault for your accident-related damages
Even if circumstances don’t allow your lawyer to secure evidence from the scene, they will still use all available evidence to prove who caused the accident.
Documenting Medical Costs, Pain and Suffering, and Other Damages
Your car accident attorney will document all the damages you’ve suffered because of the at-fault party’s negligence. Some types of documentation your lawyer may use are:
- X-rays and other medical images
- Medical bills
- Doctors’ diagnoses of injuries, descriptions of symptoms, and prescribed treatments
- Mental health experts’ diagnoses of your accident-related pain and suffering
- Bills for repairing or replacing your car
Trust your lawyer to secure any other documentation proving the collision’s cost.
Determining the Exact Cost of Your Damages
Your lawyer will determine the exact financial cost of each of your damages—including those that don’t have a cut-and-dry financial value, like pain and suffering.
If circumstances call for it, your lawyer will work with economists, medical professionals, and any other experts who may help determine the cost of your case.
Dealing with Insurance Companies (and Protecting Your Rights)
One or more insurance companies may owe you money after your accident. Your attorney will oversee the claims process for you, which generally includes:
- Confirming that your claims have been filed and recognized
- Receiving and responding to all correspondence (and claim decisions) from insurers
- Arranging for a claims adjuster to evaluate your losses
- Negotiating with insurance representatives
Insurance companies may seize on any opportunity to deny your claim or underpay you. This is why you should let a lawyer deal with insurers on your behalf.
Fighting for Your Settlement
Your lawyer will most likely seek a settlement for you because:
- Statistically, settling is the most likely way for a car accident victim to secure compensation.
- Filing a lawsuit and (even more so) going to trial typically extend the timeline for car accident cases, so settling is the more efficient way to get a car accident victim’s money.
- There is always risk in going to trial, as a judge or jury ultimately decides the case outcome.
It’s almost always worth engaging in settlement negotiations, even if they don’t lead to a deal. Your car accident lawyer will present their demands to any insurance companies or other liable parties that owe you compensation—and then engage in negotiations if liable parties don’t accept the initial demands.
Handling Any Lawsuit, Trial, and Other Legal Processes
If a fair settlement offer from insurers does not come, your attorney will be ready to file a lawsuit on your behalf. Insurance companies often provide representation for any drivers or other at-fault parties.
Many car accident lawsuits end with settlements before the trial starts. That said, your attorney will be prepared for trial if liable parties don’t offer the amount of money you are entitled to.
Your Car Accident Lawyer Will Spare You from Insurers’ Bad-Faith Tactics
Dealing with insurance companies is often required after a car accident. However, these interactions can be stressful, repetitive, and high-stakes. Once you hire a lawyer, you won’t have to deal with insurance companies—or the types of bad-faith tactics they often use against claimants.
Car accident lawyers often counteract:
- Bad-faith claim denials: If one or more insurance companies deny your car accident claim, your lawyer will appeal. They will respond directly and convincingly to insurers’ stated reasons for denial.
- Lowball valuations and unfair settlement offers: Insurance companies often recognize that they are contractually obligated to pay for a claimant’s losses. Their motivation then becomes to minimize their financial losses. This leads insurers to undervalue the cost of the claimant’s losses and offer lowball settlements.
- Intentional delays: Car accident survivors are often under intense financial pressure. Some will cave to that pressure, and an insurance company may take advantage. Don’t be surprised if insurance companies offer lowball settlements, then intentionally delay, hoping you will give into the lowball settlement.
- Stonewalling during settlement negotiations: Your lawyer will engage insurers in settlement talks. Insurance companies may stand behind lowball offers, refuse to acknowledge proof of your losses, and stonewall your lawyer in other ways. Your attorney will not be daunted, as car accident lawyers are familiar with these kinds of insurance tactics.
Because most people do not have many auto accident claims throughout their lives, they might assume that auto insurers usually do what is right. However, insurers are for-profit businesses that frequently put their best interests ahead of claimants’ (and may do the same in your case).
Let a lawyer protect you, file a lawsuit if necessary, and lead your case from start to finish. All you need to do is rest, recover, and stay in touch with your attorney.
Can I Afford the Cost of a Car Accident Attorney?
You and every other car accident victim can afford a lawyer. Knowing the hardship that auto accident victims often face, attorneys generally offer their services on contingency.
Working for a contingency fee means that a car accident attorney and their firm:
Covers Your Case Costs
Your law firm will likely:
- Ensure your bills get paid while your case goes on (so you don’t go into delinquency)
- Pays for any experts who contribute to your case
- Covers filing fees and other expenses directly related to your case
You will pay no upfront or out-of-pocket costs to your law firm.
Only Gets a Fee If They Obtain Money for You
Your legal team will have to earn their fee by securing a settlement or verdict for you. In other words, your lawyer will have every financial reason to secure as much money as possible.
The better your lawyer does for you, the better your lawyer gets compensated. This is a fee arrangement that works for all parties, including you.
Your Attorney Will Seek Compensation Based on Your Unique Damages—Which May Include These
The cost of your car accident case may depend on how vehicles collided, the speed at which the accident happened, the specific injuries you’ve suffered, and many other factors. While each accident survivor has different damages, some of the most common types of damages are:
Economic Damages
Economic damages have a fairly straightforward economic cost, and for car accident victims, this may include:
- Medical expenses
- The cost of repairing a car
- The cost of replacing a totaled car
- The cost of getting temporary transportation
- Lost income
- Diminished earning capacity
- The cost of being disabled (which can include caregiver costs, medical equipment, and updates to a home)
The more serious your injuries are, the more expensive your economic damages will likely be.
Non-Economic Damages (Namely, Pain and Suffering)
Pain and suffering is the most common type of non-economic damages that car accident victims suffer. Some types of pain and suffering are:
- PTSD
- Emotional anguish
- Psychological distress
- Anxiety
- Depression
- Sleep problems
- Lost quality of life
- Scarring and disfigurement
As the name suggests, these kinds of damages do not have a clear and obvious economic cost. However, car accident lawyers assign them a financial value using the per diem or multiplier methods. Allow a lawyer to do this for you.
The Cost of Losing a Loved One Due to a Fatal Car Accident
Tens of thousands of auto accident victims lose their lives each year. Fatal car accidents can cause both economic and non-economic damages for the survivors, which may include:
- The cost of any medical care the decedent received after the accident
- Loss of consortium (which often includes loss of spousal companionship)
- Grief and other types of pain and suffering
- Loss of the decedent’s income, valuable services, and other forms of financial support
- Funeral and burial costs
Car accident lawyers leave no damage unaccounted for when composing their settlement demands.
Hire A Car Accident Attorney Today
You should never wait to hire a lawyer after a car accident. Your lawyer will need to secure evidence as soon as possible, and they may also face a critical deadline for filing any lawsuit on your behalf.
Research law firms serving your area and hire a personal injury lawyer in Chicago worthy of your trust. Then, hire them.
Gary Annes
Partner
Personal Injury Lawyer With Over Twenty Years Of Experience
Gary Annes, a partner at Abels & Annes, P.C., has dedicated over two decades to practicing personal injury law, specializing in auto accidents, premises liability, wrongful death, medical malpractice, and sexual abuse. Since earning his law degree in 1995, Gary has led numerous jury trials, and adeptly resolved cases through arbitration and mediation, securing millions in compensation for his clients.
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