Different Methods to Settle a Personal Injury Case

Answer:

What are the various ways one can settle a personal injury case in Idaho? One way you could do it, which you would not be advised to do, is to deal with the insurance company directly after the injury occurs and just try to negotiate directly with that insurance company. That, generally speaking, would be a very bad thing to do because you don’t have the information upon which to make an intelligent and informed decision as to what represents a good value of the case or not a good value. The insurance company knows and they’re trying to devalue your claim every step along the way, but that is a way of settling it. You can do that. You avoid paying lawyer fees and costs in order to do it. That’s the only benefit to that, but you’re otherwise in a situation where you’re very unlikely to command the actual value, a reasonable value of your case, particularly with all the knowledge that you need to put into that decision.

The other way, of course, is to have lawyers on your side. There are various mechanisms by which cases can settle. It’s very common, for example, these days after a lawsuit’s filed for the parties to mediate the case to go to a formal effort to try and settle the case where everybody gathers in the same place. There’s a mediator in between that goes back and forth between the sides making the effort to settle the case. That’s a formal effort at settling the case. Mediation is an extremely popular tool these days as a way of settling a case.

Another way, of course, if you’re represented by counsel on a claim, is to just negotiate like the old days with the lawyers. Every step along the way, for us to represent you, for example, you would be actively involved in the process and the decision making as to what would be a counteroffer to make at every step of the negotiating way. That, too, is a way of settling. Those are I think the three primary ways in which claims can get settled either before or after the lawsuit.

Our firm has more experience than most. We’ve been around for more than 60 years doing exclusively personal injury work. We have a legal team here that has some very high level of legal sophistication and horsepower with the actual experience of going to trial so that the other side knows that if they want to try to lowball you, then that you have on your behalf a person who’s very ready, willing, and able to go to a jury trial in order to get the amount that’s justly due.

If you have such a claim and you’re talking about the possibility of settling it, please feel free to call us. The first consultation is free. Call our law firm today. All of us are doing the same type of work and have pretty close to the same level of experience. Feel free to call us anytime.