One Approach to Set a Figure for Initial Demand

The following represents one approach New Jersey accident attorneys may use to determine the amount of the initial demand presented to the insurance company when attempting to obtain a person injury settlement.

Assessing Medical Bills

Your New Jersey accident attorneys will usually first begin to evaluate the medical bills.  Your attorney will want to ascertain if objective proof of the injury is available.  If knee cartilage damage, broken bones or an injury requiring arthroscopic surgery can be proved, your attorney can simply multiply the combined medical bills by factors of 2, 3, 4, or 5 depending on the caliber of medical records, how long the healing process took, and whether the injured body part was healthy before the injury took place.

The multiplication factor will be reduced if the body part had experienced a previous injury.  If the injury completely healed in 2 months with no continuing problems, a multiplication factor of 2 or 3 may be used.  A higher factor of 4 or 5 may be used if the injury was slow to heal (a year or more) or if a medical procedure was required.  Whatever figure is arrived at becomes the first tangible value.

Assessing Lost Income

After assessing the medical bills, your New Jersey accident attorneys will most likely then begin to determine the actual income lost as a result of the injury.  There must be complete and well-documented records of the lost income to prevent a successful rebuttal at trial.

Documentation that best serves this purpose is the calculation of the lost time at work by the weekly rate of pay.  The worst would be to estimate self-employment lost income without providing documentation, such as a letter from your accountant or copies of your tax returns.  If you are able to provide quality documentation of your loss that is thorough, reasonable and corroborates your medical reports, your New Jersey accident attorneys may be able to use a factor of 2, 3 or 4 times the total.  This constitutes the second tangible figure and will be combined with the first value described above.

Contact Us

If you would want to speak with competent and experienced New Jersey accident attorneys concerning your personal injury case, please contact accident attorney Gerald H. Clark at 877-841-8855.