Motor Vehicle & Motorcycle Accidents

Yes, when the injury is serious. No-fault means your own personal injury protection coverage pays the first portion of medical bills and lost wages regardless of fault. To recover pain-and-suffering damages from the at-fault driver, Florida requires a permanent injury, significant scarring, or permanent loss of a bodily function. Catastrophic injuries meet that threshold.

Florida's PIP statute requires that you receive initial medical treatment within 14 days of the crash to be eligible for PIP benefits. See a doctor promptly even if you believe the injury is minor. Delayed treatment also gives the insurer an argument that the injury came from something else.

Often, yes. Florida requires only $10,000 in PIP and $10,000 in property damage coverage, and does not require bodily injury coverage at all. We look for every other source of recovery, including your own uninsured and underinsured motorist coverage, the vehicle owner under Florida's dangerous instrumentality doctrine, an employer if the driver was working, and rideshare coverage. Reading policies correctly is a large part of the work.

Florida follows a modified comparative negligence rule. If you are found 50 percent or less at fault, your recovery is reduced by your share. If you are found more than 50 percent at fault, you recover nothing. Insurers push hard on fault for exactly that reason, which is why the early investigation matters.

PIP does not apply to motorcycles, so a rider's medical bills are not covered by no-fault benefits, and jurors bring assumptions about riders into the courtroom. Motorcycle cases are built to answer both problems, with a clear liability picture and a damages presentation that puts the rider's conduct beyond dispute. Florida's helmet law also affects the damages argument for riders over 21 who carry the required medical coverage.

It depends on the injuries and the insurer. Cases resolve fastest when the injury has stabilized enough to value it properly. We do not recommend settling before the full extent of the injury is known, and we prepare every case as if it will be tried, because the ones that should be, are.