Morning Bernard, I could not sleep. I spent the day helping my sister move into a new apartment, Ugh. I took a nap around 9 PM but then had to pick up Tess at 12 when she got off of work. I have not been able to get back to sleep since then. This is what has been on my mind.
My sister has been waiting for an insurance settlement for a car accident she was in last year. I found out today that the law office she was going through cut her a check a couple of weeks ago for $1000. I could not believe that the settlement was so low. I guess she called our dad and he told her to just take whatever they will give her as she needed the money. I could Not believe it! She had $4063.40 in medical bills alone and the lawyers told her that the settlement was only $7532.25. From that total they paid her medical bills, charged her $1662.60 in attorneys fees and another $806.25 in costs leaving her an Even $1000. I cannot believe that my dad told her to sign the papers and take the check without looking into it at all. I have settled a car accident claim without using a lawyer before and I received 3 times the amount of my medical bills in the settlement. They are telling her that they could not even settle for 2 times the medical bills here? Something is Wrong! Anyway, I have been looking around for a good website for information about insurance settlements and trying to find out more about the lawyer that she used. I think that they totally screwed her over. I asked her before to tell me what was going on with the case but she never called me at all about it, Sheesh. Now that she has already signed the papers and cashed the check I am not sure that she has much recourse in the matter. If I can find out that they misrepresented any of the information that they gave her then she may be able to recover some of the costs that they are charging her anyway. I am not sure if she will be able to make an adjustment to the actual insurance claim or not though. Another thing that is suspicious is that her claim was made with the driver of the car that she was in, as Mr. xxx and Ms. yyy vs. Insurance, rather than just my sister as an individual claim. There is no mention in the papers that she was presented about what the Total claim was and how much Mr. xxx recieved. The lawyer told my sister that Mr. xxx did not recieve anything out of the settlement. Yeah Right! The only papers that the lawyer gave my sister was a paper that the lawyer printed up with the information, no originals. I am going to see what I can find out this weekend on what to do. On Monday I will probably call the insurance company and see if I can find out what the Actual settlement was. If that is indeed the actual settlement then I will call her lawyer about the costs they are charging her and find out why they settled for such a low sum. My sister says that they never contacted her about the amount of the settement. She says they just showed up at the door with the check and the paper they printed up showing the costs and had her sign it. Very suspicious! As far as I know she only talked to her lawyer and not the insurance company at all. I should have probably sent this in a PM but perhaps someone else reading the board will have some comment as to what course of action can be taken from here. If you know of any good sources of information or a good contact then please let me know. I will follow up on the iBox update later OK?
Sincerely, Bob
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