Ben's Blog 
Car Accidents and Personal Injury Cases in Virginia
Do I Need An Attorney to Settle My Injury Case?
You've got a case as far as you're concerned, but here's the next big question - do you need a Virginia personal injury attorney or not? This is one of the top questions we get, which is why I wanted to share the answer with you.
If you try to figure out whether you actually need an attorney or not on your own, you may fall victim to all of the silly advertising, and end up taking on an unncessary expense. The insurance companies won't help you either, they can be misleading at best. What you should do is take some time to do your own research, and before you sign any forms with a personal injury lawyer make sure you get their books to guide you, such as we have for free.
Look, in certain circumstance you certainly can solve your case by yourself and I think two things must be true for most of these cases. One is that you had some limited duration of medical care. So you were in an accident, you either went to the Emergency Department or you saw your primary care physician shortly after the accident. You had some physical therapy or some follow-up treatment and then you have been discharged and when you’re discharged from care, you were back to full recovery. And second, these cases that contend to be settled with an attorney of those cases in which there’s no real dispute as to who was at fault.
The other situations in which you may be able to settle the case without an Virginia personal injury attorney are where the damages greatly exceed the insurance coverage. Now this can be a little bit tricky but let’s say that you were in a serious accident, you were in the intensive care unit, maybe you have a 50 or $100,000.00 of medical bills and maybe the defendant, either was uninsured or had minimal coverage. Now there are certainly some questions you need to ask but if you are absolutely convinced that the maximum amount of coverage available is less than the injuries. So you looked at your own uninsured motorist coverage, you’ve looked for umbrella coverage and it’s just not there. Then, you really don’t need an attorney; you certainly don’t need an attorney’s going to take 33 or 40% of your claim just to settle a case that is greatly in excess of the coverage limit. And – you know it’s a shame but I see a fair number of cases each year where attorneys are taking a full fee when they ended up not have to do a whole lot with the case because the coverage was so low.
So we’ve got a video on how to protect yourself by buying uninsured motorist coverage but that’s really not what we’re talking about today. But if the damages are limited and the liabilities are clear where if the amount of coverage is not big enough, then you certainly can try and settle the case on your own.
The more complicated your personal injury is, the more likely it is that a Virginia personal injury attorney is going to be able to add value for you. He or she if they are an experienced Board Certified Personal Injury Attorney will have a lot of experience evaluating and handling cases like yours in your geographic area. See it really doesn’t matter what your aunt in California got for her personal injury, what your lawyer will be able to do in your specific geographic area, his is estimate for you the value – the value of your case what a jury is likely to do, shoot your case, go to trial. So if you have broken bones, herniated discs, you take more than maybe three months to get back to full recovery. A few puniest extends of time for work or you have, let’s say a diminution in wage earning ability because your injuries’ going forward. Well in most of those cases, it makes a lot more sense to go out and hire a Board Certified specialist in your area than to try to settle the case on your own. There are certainly are a lot of pitfalls that you can fall into. Just remember when you do settle your case, that’s it. If you need more care or more treatment in the future, you generally will have closure claim and wage your right to ask for more money later.
So the bottom line is no, you don’t need a personal Injury Attorney to handle every case. Many of us in the smaller cases will meet with you and coach you through the process a bit if that’s all it takes. Most personal injury attorneys will meet with you at least on – in initial consultation basis for free and you should access that. That’s a terrific resource for you!
For everyone of course, we’ve got free videos and a ton of information at Ben Glass Law and you can order a free sample chapter of our free consumer guide, The Five Deadly Sins That Can Wreck Your Injury Claim, to learn more about personal injury claims in Virginia by following this link
If you have a question for Ben, you can submit it confidentially online at JustAskBenGlass.com.
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