Recoverable Damages After a Car Accident in Arlington

After a car accident, you are likely to suffer significant losses, including expensive medical bills, lost income, and pain and suffering. Fortunately, if you were a victim of this type of incident, the parties responsible for causing your crash are liable for your accident-related losses.

You deserve fair compensation for your injuries after a collision. An experienced motor vehicle collision attorney could help you obtain the restitution you need. To learn more about recoverable damages after a car accident in Arlington, reach out to a lawyer today.

Economic vs. Non-Economic Damages

After a motor vehicle collision in Arlington, victims should seek to collect all potential damages they’ve sustained, including medical bills, property damage, benefits to repair their cars, loss of income, and pain and suffering. The two main sources of damages are economic and non-economic.

Economic damages account for measurable losses like lost wages as well as past, present, and future, medical bills. These losses can easily be traced using medical bills and receipts for other expenses. Often, an attorney will include

Unlike monetary losses, non-economic damages cannot be calculated as precisely. These losses involve damages that courts cannot measure definitively, including payments for disability, impairment, or disfigurement—often referred to as pain and suffering. While there is no formula to calculate these damages, courts will negotiate an award based on witness statements, personal testimony, and expert opinions. Therefore, gathering evidence quickly after a crash is essential to recovering adequate compensation.

Damage Caps

There are no caps in Texas. However, attorneys often have to work within an individual’s insurance policy limits. In Texas, minimum policy limits for bodily injury are $30,000.

Punitive Damages

Punitive damages punish negligent parties for grievous conduct. Not every case involves punitive damages. These careless actions must raise to the level of intentional false harm or conduct. In those circumstances, people may be responsible for punitive damages.

Circumstances are limited to situations where a person can prove that somebody acted intentionally to hurt somebody or acted with such reckless indifference that the injury was likely—they’re not typical, and punitive damages might be available when somebody’s been driving a vehicle under the influence of drugs or alcohol. That’s the type of conduct where people or the responsible parties can be subjected to punitive damages to punish the conduct.

A good example of a situation that might warrant awarding a victim punitive damages is in a premises liability case. For example, if an apartment complex knows the gate to unguarded swimming pool is broken but fails to fix it even though several children live there and a child falls in, plaintiffs may be awarded punitive damages.

What Damages do a Person’s Auto Insurance Policy Cover?

An individual’s insurance policy will pay for property damage as well as bodily injury coverage and that would cover them if they injured someone else. Then there’s uninsured, underinsured motorist coverage for the type of collision.

If the other person’s insurance doesn’t have enough coverage, their underinsured would come in and cover the difference as well as bodily injury, or if somebody doesn’t have any insurance at all, their uninsured motorist coverage would kick in and cover the loss.

Call an Arlington Attorney to Discuss Recoverable Damages After a Car Accident

An attorney could collect and preserve evidence that helps your fight to negotiate the highest settlement amount for your injuries. In many cases, a legal representative could negotiate your medical bills down to put more money in your pocket.

If they can’t negotiate a successful settlement prior to a trial, our skilled legal team members could ultimately push to a jury trial to seek proper compensation for the injured party. Call today to learn more and find out how we could help you.