When someone is injured in another person’s home, it’s often difficult to know how to proceed when seeking the compensation needed to cover resulting medical bills and other losses.
If an injury was caused by a homeowner, the injured party may need to sue the homeowner in order to receive the money needed to cover medical bills and financial losses that result from the injury. The most important thing to remember is that: when you report the accident matters.
Why Making a Timely Claim Matters
Insurance companies generally detailed requirements about how soon they must be notified of a covered incident under the homeowners policy. Usually, the policy includes the phrase “as soon as practicable” to describe when the insurance company must be informed about a claim.
So, whether there’s an accident in your own home or you have an accident in someone else’s home, contact the insurance company as soon as you can after the accident occurs to make sure that the insurance company doesn’t have any room to deny coverage. If you are the injured party, you can ask the homeowner who their insurer is so that you can make the claim yourself.
Generally, a notification to the insurer must answer these questions:
- Who owns the policy and what is the policy number?
- How, when, and where did the accident occur?
- Who is the injured party and where do they live?
- Who are the witnesses and where do they live?
- What kind of damage or injuries resulted from the accident?
What Types of Coverage Pay for Medical Care After Injury
Once the insurance company has been notified of the accident, there are two types of coverage that can pay for the injured party’s medical bills: medical coverage and liability coverage.
Medical coverage will pay for any injury to a visitor to the home regardless of who is at fault, up to a certain limit, generally between $5,000 and $10,000, depending on the specific policy and the state where the home is located.
Liability coverage protects homeowners from financial liability due to injury or property loss caused by the homeowner or their property. Standard liability coverage has a $100,000 limit. There are two ways in which suing the homeowner would occur: if the homeowner refuses to report the claim at all or if the injured party can’t settle the claim with the insurance party.
When to Sue a Homeowner After Injury on Their Property
If the homeowner doesn’t want to report the claim or provide the injured party with the insurance company’s name, at this point, an injured party would have to sue the homeowner to obtain that information.
A lawsuit against a homeowners policy will usually occur because the injured party has been denied any settlement or is dissatisfied with the settlement offered by the insurance company.
Once a claim is made, an insurance adjuster from the homeowners insurer will contact both parties to assess what happened. After that point, they will gather records pertaining to the medical care the injured party has received.
Claimants should be wary about speaking with an insurance adjuster without their own legal representation present. Liability coverage only applies when the homeowner was negligent and that negligence resulted in the injured party’s accident.
The insurance adjuster’s responsibility is to save the insurer as much money as possible, not to help the injured party, so make sure to protect yourself appropriately if you have an accident in someone else’s home.
