by dducks75 » Wed Jun 02, 2010 04:34 am
My husband was in a car accident 5 months ago. The other parties insurance company accepted all liability because their insured was clearly at fault. Our car was repaired for est 6100 and the other party only had 5k in coverage. Just recently we recieved a property damage release offering a settlement and acknowledgement that even though we did not incurr any out of pocket damages as a result of the loss and that we still needed to sign and send back the excuted release. So my husband signed the release paperwork and sent them back. Now the other parties insurance company is saying they sent a check to my insurance company and our insurance company is saying they don't know why we are supposed to recieve this settlement money because we did not have any out of pocket expenses. What are we suppose to do in this situation, I do not feel like I'm getting straight answers?
Posted: Wed Jun 02, 2010 04:56 am Post Subject:
I'm confused...
Here is what I gather.... you had your vehicle repaired by your own insurance (which you you did not mention) and they paid your loss of $6100. The other party only had $5000 in coverage. The other person's carrier sent you a release for their insured's $5000 limits. You signed and returned this.
If this is correct, then the other carrier should pay your carrier the $5000. Your carrier should have sent the other carrier a letter letting them know that they paid your loss and therefore are entitled to any of the recovery. If your carrier never put the other carrier on written notice of this then your carrier dropped the ball... big time. It should not matter much, you just need to tell your carrier to collect the $5000 from the other carrier and you are done.
On a side note... you needed to sign the release as _you_ suffered the loss and the other person owes _you_. The other carrier needs to protect their insured with the $5000 they have so they could not issue any payment until you signed the release stating that you would accept the $5000 as payment in full. This is normal. Granted, you should have checked with your carrier first, before signing as they might have told you not to sign and gone after the at fault party for the full amount. But this never happens... as the other party is not going to have anything your carrier can easily take to address the $1100 difference (not when that person is only paying for the minimum $5000 limit in coverage).
Also, either your carrier waived your collision deductible or they owe you a large portion of it (or all of it, depending on your state laws) once they get paid that $5000. Either that or you had under-insured motorist property damage coverage, which I doubt.
Posted: Wed Jun 02, 2010 05:14 am Post Subject:
they don't know why we are supposed to recieve this settlement money because we did not have any out of pocket expenses.
As tcope has said, for you to not have had any out of pocket expense to cover a repair valued at more than the at fault party's policy limit, your insurer must have paid the claim.
I'm not sure I would agree with his statements doubting that you had under-insured motorist coverage, or that if your collision coverage was used to pay the claim, you are owed a refund of the deductible.
If you did not pay the deductible portion of the repairs as an out of pocket expense, then there's nothing for you to collect from either your insurance company or the at fault party. Your collision deductible was either waived because you had UMPD or waived for some other unknown/unstated reason.
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