My clients who have been injured in an automobile collision often are surprised to learn that they are required to reimburse their own insurance company for their medical bills.\u00a0 They ask, \u201cWhy do I have to pay back my own insurance company?\u201d<\/p>\n
Good question, but, first, a bit of background.\u00a0 Everyone who has a car should have Personal Injury Protection (\u201cPIP\u201d) insurance.\u00a0 <\/b>\u00a0PIP will pay your medical bills if you are injured as the result of an automobile collision.\u00a0 If you do not have PIP insurance (or if you aren\u2019t sure whether you have it), RUN, don\u2019t walk, to the phone and call your insurance agent!!\u00a0 PIP insurance is one of the best types of insurance you can purchase.\u00a0 It is inexpensive and will pay for your medical treatment if you are injured as the result of an automobile collision, regardless of who was driving and regardless of who was at fault.\u00a0 It will also cover you if you are injured while in someone else\u2019s car, as well as if you are a pedestrian or on a bicycle.\u00a0 Unlike health insurance, there is no deductible, no co-pay, no-preauthorization requirement, and you can choose your own healthcare providers.\u00a0 The only requirements are that (1) the treatment is received within three years from the date of the collision; (2) the treatment is provided by a licensed healthcare provider; (3) the cost of the treatment is reasonable; and (4) the treatment is necessary to treat injuries you suffered as a result of the collision.\u00a0 In addition, it provides a small reimbursement for funeral expenses, lost wages, and loss of services (childcare, lawn care, household care, etc.).\u00a0 There are different levels of insurance you can purchase.\u00a0 We strongly recommend that you purchase at least $35,000 worth of PIP insurance.<\/b><\/p>\n
It is PIP insurance, not the insurance for the person who caused the collision, that will pay your medical bills while you recover from your injuries.\u00a0 After you have recovered sufficiently so that your case can be settled, the other insurer (often referred to as the \u201cthird party insurer\u201d) should pay you not only for your \u201cpain and suffering,\u201d but also for the cost of your medical treatment (even though it has already been paid by your PIP insurer).\u00a0 So, why do you have to pay back your own insurer?\u00a0 <\/i>Because your insurer was simply advancing the money so that you could get medical treatment until the third party insurer reimbursed you for it.\u00a0 If you kept that money, you would receive that money twice and would be \u201cdouble dipping.\u201d<\/p>\n
Fortunately, Washington State has consumer-friendly insurance laws that benefit injured people who hire attorneys.\u00a0 In the old days, your insurance company could simply sit back and wait until your case was settled and then demand 100% of the money that you received from the third party insurer to reimburse you for your medical treatment.\u00a0 The Washington State Supreme Court agreed that this wasn\u2019t fair and that your insurance company should share in the cost of the attorney\u2019s fees and litigation costs that you incurred to recover the money for your pain and suffering and your medical bills.\u00a0 In other words, your insurance company doesn\u2019t get a free ride!\u00a0 As a result, if you hire an attorney to represent you, your insurance company must discount its recovery by the amount of your attorney\u2019s fees (usually 1\/3 of the total recovery) plus its share of any litigation costs (the cost of court filing fees, medical records, deposition fees, etc.) you incur.\u00a0 This is a win-win for insured consumers who have been injured.<\/p>\n
This is the way that your case should work if you are injured:<\/p>\n
Because we charge a contingent fee on injury cases and we take only a percentage of what we are able to collect for you, we do not get paid until your case is resolved, which means that you get the benefit of our work without having to pay an hourly rate as the case is progressing.\u00a0 We also handle all the communications with the third party insurer and your PIP insurer so that we make sure that you get a fair recovery from the third party insurer and only reimburse the PIP insurer for the amount required under law.<\/p>\n
If you do not have PIP insurance, or if you are injured as a result of something other than an automobile collision and cannot use your PIP insurance, your health insurer may pay your bills while you recover.\u00a0 However, if you use your health insurance, you will have to pay your deductible and co-pays when you receive your medical treatment.\u00a0 In addition, your health insurer will still require that you reimburse it, but those laws may be much less favorable to you, depending on your insurance plan, than your PIP insurance.\u00a0 In some cases, your health insurer is entitled to demand that you pay for 100% of the benefits it paid, regardless of whether you are fully compensated for your injuries.\u00a0 For this reason alone, it is important that you purchase PIP insurance so that you can use it if you are injured as the result of an automobile collision.<\/p>\n
Although we hope this article has explained the PIP repayment issue, it is admittedly a confusing area of the law.\u00a0 Fortunately, at Nelson Boyd, we have years of experience in dealing with all types of insurers.\u00a0 We know how to maximize our clients\u2019 recovery while satisfying their obligations to their insurers.\u00a0 If you have been injured, give Nelson Boyd a call at (206) 971-7601.<\/b><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":1316,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[2],"tags":[26,38,46,118,175,75],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nelsonboydlaw.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/626"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nelsonboydlaw.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nelsonboydlaw.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nelsonboydlaw.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nelsonboydlaw.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=626"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/www.nelsonboydlaw.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/626\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3275,"href":"https:\/\/www.nelsonboydlaw.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/626\/revisions\/3275"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nelsonboydlaw.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1316"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nelsonboydlaw.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=626"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nelsonboydlaw.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=626"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nelsonboydlaw.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=626"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}