If you’ve suffered an injury, you may be wondering whether insurance companies will pay for your damages. The answer is yes! But keep in mind that injured people are often limited by the insurance company’s policy limits.
How Insurance Policy Limits Work
Insurance companies are in business to make money. They have a finite amount of time and resources, so they’re not going to spend any more on things that don’t generate revenue. Insurance policies are written with limits so that you pay less than the policy limit if your injury is caused by another party’s negligence (more on this later).
Insurance companies use two different types of insurance policies: primary and excess. Primary coverage pays out under certain conditions; excess coverage pays out over and above those conditions.
Can You Collect Excess Damages?
Excess damages are the amount over your insurance policy limits. This can be a big deal, so it’s important to know how much you’re entitled to collect in excess damages when filing a claim. In some cases, if you have an accident with another driver who was at fault and caused damage on your car or other property that wasn’t covered by their policy (such as the damage caused by their negligence), the court may award “excess” damages for what wasn’t paid out of their own pocket (i.e., their negligence).
Your insurance company doesn’t pay these types of claims from its own coffers; rather, they are added onto each person’s premium as part of their deductible/coverage limit amount paid out by them back into our pockets as premiums every month!
When the Insurance Company Acts in
When an insurance company acts in bad faith and refuses to pay out on a claim, you may have grounds for a lawsuit. Personal injury lawyer in Red Deer says that if the insurance company delays paying out on your claim, this could also be grounds for a lawsuit.
In addition to suing for fraud or misrepresentation, there are other potential legal claims that you can make against an insurer:
Bad Faith
Bad faith is a legal term that refers to an insurer’s unreasonable conduct or behavior. An insurer can act in bad faith by denying coverage, making threats of litigation, or otherwise interfering with your ability to access the benefits you’re entitled to under your policy.
Bad faith also includes situations where insurers fail to pursue claims on which they have an obligation—for example, not reporting injuries within a reasonable time period after receiving them (the “duty” aspect of bad faith). This is called “fraudulent concealment.”
Learn more about what’s possible when insurance companies refuse to pay.
When an insurance company refuses to pay you, it’s generally considered bad faith. The law defines bad faith as “an intentional lack of justifiable motives in acting.”
You can tell if an insurance company is acting in bad faith by looking at their actions and determining whether or not they’re using your case for profit instead of caring about the needs of injured people. For example:
If a company takes years to resolve your injury case without making any progress toward resolution, this may be evidence that they’re trying to avoid paying out on claims like yours (and not because they’ve run out of money).
If a lawyer tells you that he’s trying his best but thinks it’ll take longer than usual because there are other cases being worked on at the same time as yours (and this happens even though he hasn’t been given any extra time), then such behavior could indicate bad faith behavior by the lawyer.