300+ Google Reviews
One of your early challenges in a personal injury claim is dealing with what the insurance company thinks passes for a settlement offer. You likely need to go through many rounds of proposals and counterproposals before you end up reaching an agreement. Patience is required during the claim settlement process because the insurance company insists on progressing only glacially.
The best way to deal with an insurance company is to show them that you mean business. They may only respond fairly when you hire an experienced attorney. The Beaufort personal injury lawyers at Schiller & Hamilton are here to fight for your legal rights.
Why Are Initial Settlement Offers From the Insurance Company Lower Than Expected?
The insurance company may take several weeks or months to respond to your initial claim.
They may either deny your claim entirely, or they can make you a settlement offer.
If their choice is the latter, it is not necessarily the win that you think it is. Chances are that the initial settlement offer could be so low that you may wonder if the insurance company is even serious about your well-being.
This low offer is not unique to you, nor is it aimed at you in any way. This is simply how insurance companies do business to settle claims on terms that are most advantageous to them.
The insurance company is like any negotiator in the claim settlement process. While there is certainly a profit-driven motive for the insurance company to act as they do, you cannot expect any negotiator to make you their best offer right away.
From the insurance company’s perspective, they are making you a low settlement offer because they want to reach the resolution that favors them the most. In other words, they want to get away with paying as little as possible on your claim.
Insurance companies try to wear you down
Insurance companies know that they are the ones with the money that you need. They use that fact to their advantage, thinking that you are desperate and ready to accept whatever they offer you. Insurance companies believe that time is on their side in the claims process. They think that the more time that elapses, the stronger their position is.
However, if you both hire a lawyer and strengthen your resolve, the insurance company may not get the better of you in the way that they think.
The insurance company knows exactly how much your claim is worth at the outset of the process. Their adjuster has thoroughly analyzed your claim and has run it through the company’s technical models with data from similar claims throughout the country. While the insurance company knows the true value of your claim, their goal is to settle it for as far below that number as possible.
Lowball Settlement Offers Are Designed to Test You
The initial settlement offer that the insurance company makes you serves many purposes, but none include a serious attempt to settle your claim.
The initial offer is a test to see what you may be willing to accept and what you come back with settlement negotiations. The insurance company may be putting down a placeholder to signal that they want to settle your claim, but they still want to go through the whole process of negotiating the amount with you.
To make it as clear as possible: you are never under any obligation to accept the initial settlement offer or any other one that the insurance company makes during the negotiation process if it’s too low.
When you have established that someone else was to blame for your accident, you are the one who has the legal right to full financial compensation for your injuries. The insurance company is trying to settle the case because they are the ones who are liable to pay you, and they want to protect their bottom line. If they do not offer you enough money, you do not have to accept what they propose.
What to Do After a Low Settlement Offer
If the insurance company makes you an inadequate settlement offer, you have two options:
- You can continue with negotiations by making them a counteroffer.
- You can file a lawsuit in court, or continue litigating the one that you have already filed.
There is only one entity that has any power to make a binding decision, and it is not the insurance company. A jury is the only one that can determine conclusively how much damage you are due. If the insurance company will not play ball with you fairly, you can take your case to trial and let the jury decide the matter.
You get to decide how to proceed. Insurance companies are often afraid of juries because they know they could be ordered to pay more than they otherwise would have in a settlement agreement.
Hiring an experienced personal injury lawyer is your protection against the lowball negotiation tactics that an insurance company uses. First, your lawyer can review the specifics of your case to help you learn how much your claim may be worth. Without this crucial information, you may be susceptible to accepting the initial settlement offer which may be too low. Second, your lawyer would review the offer with you to determine how far below fair value it is.
Contact a South Carolina Personal Injury Lawyer Today
Insurance companies respect the attorneys at Schiller & Hamilton because we know how to force the issue. Our attorneys are no strangers to the inside of a courtroom, and insurance companies know it. Hiring our injury lawyers gives you a fighting chance of getting what you deserve in the personal injury claims process.
You can begin the legal process by speaking with one of our attorneys during a free case review. To schedule the initial consultation, you can send us a message through our website, or you can call us today at 803-902-4583. You owe us nothing unless you win your case.