Georgia Uninsured Motorist and Med Pay Is Essential
People often struggle to make ends meet in Atlanta and throughout Georgia. For this reason, many people look for ways to save money everywhere they can. This is understandable. However, many people do not understand what the risk is to cutting corners on your Georgia car insurance should you have the misfortune of being seriously injured in a car wreck.
Georgia laws require that anyone who owns a car that is being driven on Georgia roads to have car insurance. Georgia law only requires liability coverage of $25,000/$50,000/$25000. This would be minimum coverage and would mean that the car insurance would only cover liability claims up to a maximum of $25000 per injured person and would only cover up to $50,000 per accident for Georgia personal injury claims. Since medical bills are higher than ever, if you are at fault for an accident and seriously injury another driver or pedestrian, then you could be on the hook for any excess jury verdict for the Georgia personal injury claim. This means that your personal assets (bank accounts, cars, houses, boats, etc.) could be lost if there was a jury verdict against you of more than your liability policy limits.
Another type of coverage available to you in your Georgia car insurance is uninsured motorist coverage and medical pay (med pay) coverage. These coverages are not required by Georgia law, but do offer you significant protection should you be seriously injured in a car wreck in Atlanta or throughout Georgia. Uninsured Motorist Coverage in Georgia is insurance coverage for any car wreck personal injury claims when the negligent driver who hurts you does not have auto insurance. This coverage can really be a life saver because if you do not have uninsured motorist coverage and you are injured by an uninsured driver, then you would not have any insurance coverage for your claim. Your only remedy would be to sue the individual and try to collect from their personal assets. The problem with this is that most people who are driving without car insurance do not have a lot of assets to recover against.
Uninsured motorist coverage also serves as under-insured motorist coverage when your claim is worth more than the negligent driver's liability policy limits. Recent changes in Georgia law for uninsured motorist coverage will give you the option to elect add on uninsured motorist coverage which would allow you to stack your uninsured motorist coverage on top of the liability policy. Traditional uninsured motorist coverage, now called "reduction" or "limits to limits" coverage [see O.C.G.A. Section 33-7-11(b)(1)(D)(ii)]. Under traditional uninsured motorist (which all uninsured motorist policy in Georgia if issued prior to 01/01/09), there is only under-insured motorist coverage when your uninsured motorist coverage exceeds the amount of liability policy limits. For example, under traditional uninsured motorist coverage ("reduction" or limits to limits") if you had $25,000 in uninsured motorist coverage and the liability policy was also $25,000, then you would have no under-insured motorist coverage. If you had $50,000 in uninsured motorist coverage on a "reduction" or "limits to limits" car insurance policy, then you would have $25,000 of uninsured motorist coverage. To have an under-insured motorist claim you must always obtain a policy limits offer from the liability carrier or you cannot pursue an under-insured motorist claim at all.
Georgia Medical Payment Coverage or "Med Pay" is medical coverage for you and anyone in your car who is injured in a car wreck. Since there are car wrecks in Atlanta and across Georgia every day, this coverage can be incredibly helpful. This coverage is a elected add on to your Georgia car insurance policy so you do not have to have it. You purchase a specific amount ($1000, $5000, $10,000, etc.) and each injured party in your car can get the medical treatment they need from a doctor of their choice up to that purchased amount. This Med Pay coverage can be especially important to people who do not have health insurance and need to have expensive tests, surgeries, pain management, etc. Without Med Pay or health insurance many specialists such as orthopaedic surgeons, neurologists, pain management doctors, etc. will not agree to treat injured people.
The cost of adding uninsured motorist coverage and med pay coverage is lower than you might expect. I strongly recommend you have these valuable coverages if you can afford it to protect yourself and your passengers should a tragic car wreck, truck wreck, motorcycle wreck, pedestrian accident occur to you or the ones you love.
As you can see there are many complex legal issues surrounding how to stack multiple car insurance claims. For this reason, it is very important to contact experience Georgia personal injury attorneys to represent you on these claims. The second reason why you need to hire a experience Georgia personal injury claim is because usually great settlements are the result of outstanding negotiation and litigation skills. Adjuster usually will offer far less to injured parties who are not representing because they know you do not know the true value of the case and do not have the ability to litigate the case if the adjuster's offers are unreasonable.
For a free case evaluation or legal consultation please do not hesitate to call me at 866-847-6535 or visit our website at http://www.griffinlawfirmpc.com/index.html.
Richard Griffin
Attorney At Law.
