What happens if you have no insurance but the other driver was at fault?

No Insurance, But Other Driver at Fault

Generally, the same thing that would happen if you did have insurance. Although every state has different insurance laws, fault is not determined by who has or does not have insurance. This is a common mistake. However, all states have penalties for driving uninsured and in most states, they can be severe. Penalties such as license suspension, heavy fines, road crew assignments, etc. This is in addition to the increased cost of your insurance. But, this is true whether you have an accident or not; simply being pulled over for any traffic violation will have the same result. And if you did cause the accident? Oh, man....

Here are more opinions and answers from other FAQ Farmers:

• In the cases where the other driver was at fault, they (or their insurer) should pay. However, YOU will have to submit the claim to their insurance carrier. And their carrier will say they are not going to pay because yada-yada-yada. So then you have to sue. In most jursidictions, each driver will collect from their own insurance company and the companies take care of all the nasty stuff.

• I was just in an accident and immediately began calling attorneys. Get an attorney, and don't just handle it yourself. Try to go for a traffic law attorney and claim for personal injury. Whatever you do don't give a statement to the insurance company and don't let them talk to anyone but your attorney. They may seem nice, but they aren't your friend, and you really can view yourself as the enemy toward them. I was told the insurance adjuster would be out there by today, and they still haven't come. The car accident happened almost a week ago and my car is sitting out in a lot uncovered with the interior exposed. Get insurance if you can, even liability, because at least you'll have help from an insurance company that's willing to deal with the issues for you.

Answer

In most cases, the other party will pay for your vehicle damages -IF- their insurance company accepts liability. That is a function of whether or not the other person admits liability, if there is a police report in your favor, or if there are witnesses to the accident that support the contention that the other party was at fault. Some states have a "no pay, no play" law which bars people from suing for non-economic damages if they are uninsured but that restricts pain and suffering type of claims. Not auto damages.

If the adverse insurance company denies liability, should you get an attorney? That depends on the facts of the case. It is not always in your best interest to get an attorney involved. If you are injured, you should get an attorney. If you are just trying to recover your vehicle damages, there are more cost effective/time effective options. Getting an attorney for auto damages only WILL BE COUNTERPRODUCTIVE for a number of reasons.

1.) it would be hard to find a lawyer to take such a case because the money is too small.

2.) a lawyer would never actually take this kind of case to court because it would cost more to go to court than the entire claim is worth. Instead the attorney would try to negotiate the claim and take a reduced settlement so they don't have to go to court. This is going to mean less money for you

3.) the attorney is going to take a third of the reduced settlement they collect further reducing the money you get.

4.) when an attorney gets involved in an insurance claim, it sets off warning signals to insurance adjusters and the claim is handled differently. namely the insurance company is going to hire and attorney to deal with your attorney and the entire process is going to be drug out over years

In the end, you are going to wait a really long time to get a disappointing settlement.

There is an alternative to getting an attorney though. You can hire a subrogation company who is a member of "intercompany arbitration". A subrogation company is a company that specializes in recovering money from insurance companies. Intercompany arbitration is a process where the case is reviewed by a panel of people who decide which party is at fault and force them to pay for the other party's damages. It is like going to court but it is much cheaper and way faster. Plus they can recover the whole the amount instead of negotiating a reduced settlement. Just make sure that the subrogation company is a member of arbitration though. If they are not a member of the arbitration group they cannot file arbitration against the insurance company. Then they are just going to try to negotiate the claim like an attorney does.

I did this myself with a company called Cerberus Subrogation Professionals. www.cerberussubro.com if you want to check them out. It worked really well. Faster and cheaper than getting an attorney and I got more money than I would have with an attorney.

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