Newport Beach Injury Lawyer

There is no simple way to answer the question about how much a victim is owed after a personal injury, which is a big part of why the settlement negotiation process can be so contentious and complex. In order to get an understanding of how much you may be entitled to, you will need to sit with an attorney and go through a range of impacts on your life. These impacts include both economic and non-economic damages, meaning that you are entitled to compensation for things that have dollar values — like your medical bills and lost wages — as well as damages that do not have measurable values — like your pain and suffering, as well as your emotional health. 

Your attorney will spend a lot of time doing extensive research into your situation before returning to you — and the insurance company — with an accurate figure for the amount of compensation you are owed. However, there is more work to be done. Once your attorney submits the total damages, they will need to negotiate with the insurance company in order to reach a settlement agreement.

There is no legal requirement for a victim to hire an attorney in order to seek compensation for a personal injury claim, but the reality is that the insurance company is the biggest beneficiary when they do not. Tort law is complicated, and insurance companies have spent decades developing aggressive strategies designed to settle cases quickly and cheaply without much regard for the claimant’s needs or financial health. When you have an attorney representing you throughout the claims process, you have an experienced and proven advocate who will be pushing back at every chance with the intention of getting you what you deserve, NOT just the money the insurer wants to pay. 

During our zero-obligation consultation, we will be able to go through all of the many benefits of working with our law firm to get the money you deserve. Contact us now to discuss your situation and help you understand how we have helped many others in similar situations to yours and how we can help you move forward after an accident that you did not cause.

Although we can’t say for certain that an insurance company would never make a reasonable first offer, it is rare for an initial settlement offer to be anywhere near the amount that the claimant is actually owed. This is because insurance companies do not exist to pay victims the amount of money they actually deserve; insurance companies exist to protect their own clients from personal liability while profiting off of the premiums they collect each year. 

In order to stay profitable, insurance companies must settle claims for as little as possible. If they voluntarily paid the total amounts owed to victims, they would not be able to stay in business. NEVER accept a settlement offer from an insurance company without consulting an attorney first.

To determine whether or not you may be able to proceed with a personal injury lawsuit, you must first answer three simple questions:

• Were you involved in an accident or situation that was caused by someone else’s actions?
• Were you injured as a result of these actions?
• Did your injuries cause financial impacts on your life?

If you are able to answer ‘yes’ to these questions, or if you are unsure, then contact our team immediately to discuss moving forward with your case. No two injuries or accidents are alike, meaning that no two personal injury cases are the same, and we will work to develop a case that is specific to your experience in order to get you the justice that you deserve.

Examples of Personal Injury Cases

There are many different injuries that can result in a lawsuit, provided that it meets the above criteria or is otherwise caused by someone else’s actions. However, here are a few examples of common cases that are heard in the California court system. Again, keep in mind that if you do not see your own situation listed below, it does not mean that you will not be able to find help from our law firm.

• Car accidents
• Traumatic brain injuries
• Drunk driving
• Slip and fall
• Pedestrian accidents
• Motorcycle crashes
• Defective products
• Medical malpractice

After you are involved in an accident that is covered by the other party’s insurance company, you will work directly with an insurance agent who will compile the information about your accident, your injuries, and your overall situation. The insurance company will respond to your claim and make you a settlement offer after assessing all of the details of the accident. Although this amount may seem appealing, especially if you are experiencing some financial stress after your accident, you must understand that this offer is nowhere near the amount that you are truly owed, and accepting it will block your future ability to seek the actual damages you deserve.

Instead of accepting this offer, you should consult with an experienced attorney who can deal with the insurance company and begin a series of negotiations for an amount that appropriately addresses your suffering. If these negotiations fail or you are unable to reach a settlement that addresses your issues, then your attorney will likely advise that you move forward with a lawsuit.

There are a variety of factors that go into the final amount awarded to a victim in a personal injury settlement or lawsuit, and there is no simple formula to apply for any accident to determine a fair amount. In California, they are divided into compensatory damages, and in some cases, a victim is additionally awarded punitive damages. Compensatory damages are further divided into economic and noneconomic damages, and address two different aspects of the injury. Your personal injury attorney will be working to pursue compensatory damages; if a jury believes that punitive damages are deserved, then they will make that decision.

Read more below to get an idea of some issues that will be factored into your total award:

Economic Damages

Economic damages cover impacts of your accident that have actual dollar-valued repercussions. This means that something like an ambulance ride or medical treatment, where you receive a bill or time that you have missed from work, where you lose out on actual income. We will go through your entire situation to determine the economic damages that we will seek compensation for. The most common economic damages are things like hospital bills, recovery costs, lost wages, surgery and medical procedures, and disability. If we believe that you will continue to suffer economic consequences from your injuries, such as from long-term disability or future medical procedures, we will additionally account for these in your settlement.

Economic damages are paid back to your insurance company first, as they (in many cases) have paid for a large portion of these costs up-front.

Noneconomic Damages

Noneconomic damages are the impacts of your injuries that do not have set dollar values appended to them but are no less important to address. They include things like your pain and suffering from your injuries, medical procedures, and the pains of recovery. In addition, you may suffer from fear, trauma, or depression because of your experience or from a diminished quality of life because you are unable to pursue your interests and hobbies. In the cases of wrongful death, we will additionally sue for a loss of consortium and other “non-financial” impacts to your loss.

Since non-economic damages do not have a cost associated with them, we will approach these calculations differently than simply compiling invoices and receipts. In order to present a jury with a fair number for these damages, we will determine a multiplier that we believe represents the intangible impacts on your life. Once we have found a reasonable multiplier, we will apply that to your economic damages and add that amount to the total number we are seeking. For example, if we were to use a multiplier of 3x and you have $100,000 of economic damages, then we will seek $100,000 + (3 x $100,000) for a total of $400,000 in compensatory damages.

Punitive Damages

In certain situations where a jury determines that the defendant has acted in a particularly reprehensible or egregious manner to cause your injuries, you will be awarded additional punitive damages. These damages are not intended to compensate you for any of your injuries or suffering, but instead, serve to punish the person or party who caused the injuries. As such, punitive damages are not sought after by the victim and their legal team and are not factored into the amount that we determine to be fair for your situation.