Rakin, Justin, and I take great pride in helping our clients rebuild their lives with dignity after suffering an injury or losing a loved one due to no fault of their own. On a very practical level, our ability to do so is controlled by the amount of insurance available to compensate our clients.
Having practiced personal injury law for over 40 years, I have seen a steady increase in the seriousness of the injuries suffered and those killed, along with an increase in the cost of medical care. At the same time, I have seen an increasing number of cases in which our clients are not fully compensated because of insufficient automobile insurance limits.
Several very serious injury cases and several death cases we are currently handling have brought this point home, as the lack of sufficient insurance has resulted in our client or their families not receiving the compensation necessary to move forward with their lives. Regrettably, adding further insult to injury. As we have written about before, in a personal injury claim arising from a car accident, two types of automobile insurance are involved.
What Are the Liability Limits of an Insurance Policy?
First is the liability limits of the policy covering the at-fault driver, and second is the uninsured/underinsured (UI/UIM) limits of the injured client. In 2024, Virginia joined the rest of the country (except New Hampshire) in mandating every car driver carry insurance. The current liability minimum for car insurance are the following:
- Injury or death of one person: $50,000
- Injury or death of two or more people: $100,000
- Property damage: $25,000
Of course, none of us control the insurance limits of another driver. That is why the new insurance laws provide for mandatory inclusion of uninsured and underinsured liability coverage. The amount of coverage must match what you carry for liability insurance. However, you can opt of this additional if you want to manage your premiums.
However, it is important to consider that the amount of uninsured/underinsurance limits that we choose to carry gives each of us the ability to better protect our families and ourselves in the event we are involved in a crash. This is because uninsured/underinsured coverage provides additional coverage equal to the difference between the negligent driver’s liability policy limits and your uninsured/underinsured limits.
For example, if the negligent driver has $50k/person in liability limits and you have $100k/person in uninsured/underinsured limits, you would have a total of $150k available in compensation. In the same example, if you had a $300k/person UI/UIM limit, you would have a total of $300k in insurance available for compensation. For those with good driving records, the annual cost between a policy with $100k/person UI/UIM limits and $300k/person UI/UIM limits is nominal given the amount of additional coverage it buys.
So as a clarion call to each of you, to better protect yourself and your family, please review the uninsured/underinsured limits on your automobile policies now, speak with an experienced insurance agent for advice, or call me to discuss as I am happy to address any of your questions.
Be well. Tom.
