Most of the time, car drivers share lanes with semi-trucks that have to transport freight daily. The extreme weight and length of the semi-trucks contribute to catastrophic collisions that often result in severe injuries. As a result, victims of these accidents usually face substantial medical bills, are forced to miss work to nurse their injuries, and have to cope with the resulting emotional and physical pain. These victims are entitled to ask why they would cover all the financial, emotional, and physical loss alone.

The truth is that they should not face these losses when another party is at fault for the collision. They have a right to pursue the liable party for compensation. Once the victim has sued the liable party, the liable party's property insurance company seeks to settle the case. Most victims do not know how settlement works and the amount they should receive for compensation. Consequently, they end up agreeing to all of the insurance company's demands and settling for less than they deserve.

This blog explains how settling a semi-truck collision case works. Reading through it will put you in a position to fight for the compensation you deserve when involved in a semi-truck accident. You also have to reach out to a personal injury attorney soon after you have been involved in an accident for more help and legal counsel.

Settlements Can Occur Anytime Between the Collision and Trial Verdict

Settling a semi-truck crash case occurs anywhere between the first day of the crash and the time a jury reaches a verdict. You want to remember this. If the liable party's insurance provider's representative approaches you days after your collision and offers to settle, accepting their offer ends your case. You waive your right to file a suit by agreeing to the settlement. This can lead to the conclusion of your case before you even notice it has started.

The last time an insurer can offer a settlement, and you can accept, is moments before the court delivers a verdict, which would mean the case went to trial without settling outside of court.

Most semi-truck crash settlements occur shortly after the involved victim hires an experienced personal injury lawyer or files a lawsuit. Insurers regard either of the mentioned incidents as an indication the victim understands their legal rights and can invoke them. Insurance providers will start making reasonable offers to settle the case whenever they see they will need to deal with a personal injury lawyer.

But most victims in semi-truck accidents have financial duties that prevent them from dragging their personal injury cases. This may hinder them from recovering the compensation they deserve when a case settles. Some insurance companies know this, so they delay claims to augment the victim's financial pressure.

The Settling Period is Indefinite

The period between the accident and the trial verdict could be days or several months. Many elements are involved in settling semi-truck personal injury cases, so it could naturally take several months. Some evaluative questions considered are:

  • Did the semi-truck driver cause the crash?
  • Is more than one party liable for the collision?
  • What caused the accident?

If you are a semi-truck accident victim and want the case settled as soon as possible, the ideal way to ensure there is no delay is to collect as much evidence as possible from the accident scene. Gathering evidence after a collision keeps details of the accident and ensures the facts of the crash are not altered. If you do not collect evidence after a collision, it leaves room for the liable party to place the blame on you or say you are partly to blame for the crash to have you agree to a lower settlement amount than you deserve.

Other aspects that can delay the period within which a truck accident personal injury case can settle are:

  • An unclear fault.
  • Unknown nature of the injuries.
  • Lengthy negotiation.

Apart from collecting evidence from the accident scene, other ways you can increase the chances of settling your case as soon as possible is to seek urgent medical attention and consult a lawyer concerning your case. Without an attorney's counsel and guidance, it may take several weeks or even months to settle your claim, and worse still, lack of legal knowledge may be the difference between recovering a low or high settlement.

Settlement Amounts Vary

For semi-truck collisions, settlements range from a few thousand dollars to over ten million dollars. Therefore, it would need to be more accurate to state the exact average semi-truck settlement value. Semi-truck accidents vary, so there cannot be an average settlement amount.

The broad array of settlement values is because of the damages victims have the right to recover if their case proceeds to trial in court. Based on the case facts, semi-truck accident victims may not recover the same damages. The possible verdict the respondents would be subject to inform their offers to settle outside of court.

The damages you can obtain from a particular defendant or defendants in a semi-truck accident case include:

  • Lost earning capacity and wages— most semi-truck crash victims suffer severe injuries that make them incapable of working while they recover. Luckily, they can include lost income in the settlement calculations. If you cannot return to work after reaching the maximum medical recovery, you can be eligible for damages for lost earning potential and wages.
  • Medical bills— medical expenses in a semi-truck collision case include all the necessary and reasonable costs related to treating your injuries. Along with hospital bills and ambulance fees, this may consist of the expenses for ongoing care, like physiotherapy and possible procedures you might require as your body heals.
  • Cost of replacing or repairing property damage.
  • Loss of consortium.
  • Funeral expenses, loss of consortium and support, and burial costs if the accident led to the death of your loved one.
  • Pain and suffering— pain and suffering is not a tangible loss. However, anyone who has ever suffered severe injuries understands that the psychological repercussions can be as severe as those of tangible losses.
  • Out-of-pocket expenses— you can claim damages for all out-of-pocket costs you incur as a direct consequence of the injuries you sustained, for example, costs related to domestic help, alternative transport, and home/vehicle modifications.
  • Loss of enjoyment of life— a debilitating injury may make it challenging to enjoy day-to-day life the same way you used to before being injured. Depending on the seriousness and extent of your injury, you may be incapable of participating in your favorite leisure activities. If that is the case, you may include a lack of enjoyment of life in the calculation of your settlement.
  • Punitive damages— even though most semi-truck crash claims do not warrant punitive damages, there are cases in which victims may recover them. In California, you can pursue punitive compensation if the at-fault party acted willfully or deliberately with disregard for others' rights or with the knowledge that their actions would likely cause others injuries.

Although, shared fault rules can reduce these damages by the percentage of liability you contributed to the semi-truck collisions. This can significantly lower the compensation amount you would recover.

California applies the pure comparative fault rule. This means you would still recover damages even if you are liable for the crash as the victim. However, your compensation amount would be reduced by your percentage of fault. This means if you are 99% at fault, you will recover damages, but your proportion of guilt will reduce the recovery amount, so you will only recover 1% of the compensation value.

Some states apply the modified comparative rule where the involved victim will not qualify to recover any damages if their liability hits a given level— for some states, it is 50%, while for others, 51%. Other states use the contributory negligence rule, where the victim is barred from recovering damages if they contributed to the accident whatsoever. Under the contributory negligence rule, a victim will not recover damages even if they are 1% at fault.

Shared fault rules are just one factor that can substantially affect the settlement value. Other factors that can increase or lower the settlement value include:

Your Lawyer's Expertise

In each case, all victims injured in a semi-truck accident should receive total compensation from insurers. Unfortunately, that is not how insurers operate. They will try to shortchange victims of their deserved money, particularly when they (victims) do not have a lawyer to protect their interests and defend their rights.

Insurance adjusters will question the severity of your injuries and pin the blame on you if it saves their company finances. Trucking companies may also have a team of attorneys on standby, ready to contest your insurance claim and cast doubt on your request for compensation. Hiring an experienced truck accident personal injury attorney to represent you is key to your claim's success. Your lawyer can tell when an offer to settle the case is below what you deserve and fight for the maximum compensation available.

The Amount of Work Time Missed

You might only miss a day or two of work if you suffered minor injuries in the accident. In contrast, paralysis or other severe injuries might prevent you from working permanently, based on your specific situation. The income you earned for a living may have gone to providing for yourself plus your family, keeping a roof over your head, and paying bills. Since these wages will stop flowing permanently or temporarily, you can recover more compensation to cover this loss.

The Severity of the Injuries and Corresponding Expenses

Like how the vehicle size can significantly impact the settlement value offered, the severity of the injuries also substantially affects the amount of money you will receive. A minor whiplash injury is generally treated with ice or pain relievers, which do not cost much compared to treatment costs of paralysis, like long-term rehab, medical equipment purchase, and a long-term or lifetime medication supply. Whether the injury is temporary or permanent or if it resulted in physical disfigurement or not also impacts the settlement amount

The Medical Care Costs

You can easily add the hospital bills and cost of the ER visit you have accumulated. When you require surgeries and intensive care, these costs multiply quickly. And when you suffer a permanent disability, you must estimate the cost of necessary support over a lifetime.

The Extent of Property Damage and Corresponding Expenses

Compensation for property damage works similarly to that for medical bills. You might recover more compensation if your vehicle was totaled instead of just being left with a small scratch. You will need to collect the required evidence to prove the extent of property damage and corresponding expenses, for example, the vehicle’s photos, and repair receipts, among others.

Other factors affecting the settlement amount include:

  • The victim’s age, education level, and occupation.
  • Whether they have children, a spouse, or a family member, they can claim loss of companionship/consortium.
  • The trucking company’s behavior before the accident.
  • How recklessly the driver was operating the semi-truck.

The Trucking Company Insurance Coverage May Not Cover the Whole Settlement

Federal regulations necessitate that trucking companies purchase liability insurance. The insurance protects the business from monetary loss by covering the cost of personal injury cases. But the minimum liability insurance coverage is just 750,000 dollars. This value was set after the enactment of the Motor Carrier Act of 1980, and since then, the FMCSA (Motor Carrier Safety Administration) is yet to change it. Due to inflation, the current value of this amount is just a small percentage of its initial value.

Consequently, trucking companies must carry only 750,000 dollars in liability insurance coverage to adhere to the law. Although this is significant, it cannot cover most moderate truck accidents anymore. Severe auto crashes, particularly those that result in fatal, life-changing, or severe injuries, have way more legal compensation than that. Serious commercial automobile collisions that involve trucks are much worse. Many wrongful death cases settle for far more.

This low minimum liability insurance coverage required for trucking companies affects victims. Should a trucking company driver cause a severe accident, the company could be held responsible under the respondeat superior law. The company would be required to compensate the victim for the truck collision, although the driver caused the collision.

However, if the trucking company only possesses the minimum required policy limits, the coverage may be depleted before the victim recovers total compensation. In this case, the remaining amount would come from the company’s bank accounts. And if the accounts are low, the victim might never receive the compensation value they deserve.

The fair news is that sometimes more than one liable party is involved in a damages claim. If the truck driver acted negligently, you could sue them for damages, apart from suing the trucking company. A truck manufacturer may also be responsible for the semi-truck accident. If a truck part fails or malfunctions and causes a crash, the company that made that part or assembled the truck would be liable. A recall on a truck part or the truck itself may also result in the manufacturer being held responsible for the accident.

Another party that could be liable for a semi-truck accident is cargo loaders. If the loader did fail to inspect the cargo or secure it properly, they might be responsible if equipment or boxes fall off and damage other cars or hit road users. The point is, if several parties are responsible for your accident, suing all of them would result in the distribution of liability among them. If that happens, you may eventually receive the compensation you deserve, even with the low minimum liability insurance coverage that the trucking company possesses.

Statute of Limitations Is Also an Important Aspect of the Settlement Process

There is a stipulated period within which injured persons can pursue legal action after a semi-truck collision or the onset of an injury. This period is known as the statute of limitations. In California, the statute of limitations is two years from the date of the injury. If you did not discover the injury soon, the statute of limitations is one year from the date you found out about it.

If you fail to file your claim within the stipulated statute of limitations, you will forfeit the right to do. And if you file when the statute of limitations has elapsed, your case will not be considered. This means you will not recover the damages you deserve and will be responsible for paying for all your accident-related costs. You want to act quickly to ensure you have a fair shot at justice and compensation.

Find an Experienced Semi-Truck Accident Personal Injury Lawyer Near Me

If you have suffered a severe injury in a semi-truck accident that was not your fault, do not let an insurance provider decide the amount of money you should recover in a settlement. The insurer can award you an amount that might not even pay half your expenses and compensate for your hardships. Instead, consult an experienced semi-truck accident lawyer, and you will understand better the damages you are entitled to and how much your case could be worth.

At Los Angeles Car Accident Attorney, we are committed to providing our clients with strong and effective legal advice and representation. We apply our strong negotiation skills when dealing with insurance companies to ensure our clients recover the settlement amount they deserve. Call us at 424-237-3600 for any questions about how settlement works or if you want to bring a claim, and we will address your case without delay.