Sometimes, insurance companies will send denial letters to clients and attorneys without having all the necessary facts regarding an accident. My general rule of thumb about these letters is that if I receive a denial letter before I receive the police report, chances are that the denial is premature. In this scenario, I will wait until I receive the crash report from the police department before making a decision whether or not to pursue the case further or to cut my losses and drop the case. If the police report is dead against my client, and there are no independent witnesses, it is probably a good idea to drop the case. If the police report is in my client’s favor, then I will usually pursue the case even if that means filing a lawsuit on my client’s behalf.
Lawsuits are costly and can take up to several years to resolve so before deciding to file a lawsuit, it is important to review the whole file in order to make a smart business decision before putting a case in court. Sometimes I find that it makes more sense to settle a case for short money out of court rather than filing a lawsuit. If I believe that the case is not worth significantly more money than is being offered by an insurance company, I will often encourage my clients to settle out of court. On the flip side, if I feel that a case has a lot more value than what is being offered, I will encourage my client to reject the low offer and to go to court. These situations need to be addressed on a case by case basis considering every little detail about the case.