You are in good hands with Ali Awad. He is a professional who knows what it takes to get the insurance company’s attention and maximize results for his clients. He is knowledgeable, an excellent communicator and truly cares about his clients. If anyone needs a personal injury attorney in the Atlanta metropolitan area, I would have no hesitation in recommending Ali Awad and his talented staff.
Practice Areas
When you’ve been in a car accident, it can be hard to know what to do first. You may be dealing with injuries that require treatment. Sometimes this becomes more complicated if your health insurance doesn’t cover some or all of the bills. Will your car insurance cover it? What about the other driver’s insurance? Many people aren’t even sure who to call next.
Meanwhile, if your injuries have left you out of work, your bills may be piling up fast, and your bank account is dwindling faster. Once your paid time off is used up, you may be scrambling for another solution. Do you have short-term disability insurance? What if you don’t? Just trying to figure out how to pay your expenses can be exhausting, especially when you may still be in pain from your injuries. You need the experience and skill of an Atlanta car accident attorney who can help you sort out what happened and how to seek damages for your injuries.
Attorney Ali Awad is one of the youngest attorneys to bring a brand new firm from inception to 8-figures in only three short years! He and his team at the CEO Lawyer Personal Injury Law Firm bring their years of experience to your car accident case, whether you need a legal team to negotiate with an insurance company or file a lawsuit.
Have you been hurt in a car accident, or is someone you love suffering because of one? If so, please contact the CEO Lawyer Personal Injury Law Firm today for a free consultation to discover the options for addressing this difficult situation. The CEO Lawyer and his team of injury and accident attorneys work on a contingency basis, so you have no upfront cost. Don’t hesitate to call (833) 254-2923 to discuss your accident and how you can get the compensation you deserve to pay for your recovery costs.
How Can You Receive Compensation for Your Injuries in a Car Accident?
First, you should gather all the paperwork pertaining to the accident, starting with the police report. If you have not received a copy, you can call the law enforcement agency that responded to the scene of the accident, and they should be able to get you one. Then collect your medical bills and try to figure out how long you’ve been out of work and how much pay you’ve lost so far. Also, include any bills for repairing damage to your vehicle and any possessions harmed in the crash.
Next, you should contact an Atlanta car accident lawyer and ask for a free consultation. An experienced attorney should be able to figure out where to seek compensation. Often this is the other driver’s insurance company, but in some cases, they may advise you to sue other parties who may have been responsible for the accident.
How Is Fault Determined in a Car Accident in Georgia?
Georgia is an at-fault state. In general, there are some basic rules about determining fault:
- If one driver breaks some traffic law, such as speeding, running a red light, driving while impaired, etc., then they are usually found to be at fault.
- When a driver was behaving negligently, such as being distracted by their phone while driving, they will usually be found to be at fault.
- When one of the cars didn’t receive appropriate maintenance, and this directly led to the accident, that car’s driver is generally at fault. For example, if the other driver had a bad light they didn’t fix, and this caused a crash, they would probably be at fault.
- In most cases, rear-end accidents are assumed to be the rear driver’s fault for failing to maintain a safe following distance.
However, these basic rules may be complicated because Georgia is also a modified comparative negligence state. This law recognizes that in many cases, more than one party may be partly responsible for an accident. For example, maybe the other driver was speeding or looking at their phone, but your car had maintenance issues that may have affected the accident. The other driver’s attorney will likely argue the crash was all your fault, and your lawyer will argue it was their fault. In reality, you may both have had some responsibility.
With modified comparative negligence, you can still recover damages from the other driver if you are found to be less than 50% at fault. In this case, your recovery will be downsized by the amount you were found to be at fault. If you are 50% or more at fault, you will not be able to collect any damages.
People often have questions about whether some issue may have made them partly at fault in an accident and by how much they might be at fault. This is really a question the jury will have to decide, but a car accident lawyer in Atlanta can help you understand the issues of your case. They can also advise you on whether your claim is likely to be successful.
It’s also important to remember that the other driver’s attorney will need to prove not only that you did something wrong but that it contributed to the accident occurring. If the other car hit you head-on, it probably wasn’t because your tail light was out, for example. Even if there was some fault on your end, the jury might not find that you were more than 50% at fault.
Recent Checks Our Clients Have Received
Tractor-Trailer Accident
3,000,000
Shoulder Injury
1,250,000
Rear-End Car Wreck
1,055,000
Rear-end Collision
250,000
Knee & Shoulder Injury
220,000
T-bone Collision
215,000
Car Wreck Requiring Injections
200,000
T-Bone Accident
200,000
Motorcycle Accident
150,000
Single Car Collision
125,000
Hit & Run Car Wreck
110,000
Motorcycle Wreck
100,000
How Much Could You Recover for Your Injuries?
This is a common question. If you were not at fault at all, your recovery depends on a wide array of factors, including how severe your injuries were, the number of your medical bills, if you’re expected to need future medical care, how much time you missed at work, if you are permanently disabled, how much property damage your car sustained, and sometimes other factors. Here are some specific damages you might ask for in a settlement:
- Medical expenses. This includes all of your existing bills, such as hospital bills, doctor’s visits, prescriptions, physical therapy, etc. It may also include an estimate for future care if you are still in treatment.
- Missed wages. This includes all time you’ve already missed at work and possibly an estimate of the future time you may miss if you are still out of work.
- Disturbance of your quality of life. If the accident has reduced your ability to live and enjoy your life, you may seek damages for this.
- Pain and suffering. This includes both physical and mental pain and suffering.
- Disfigurement or permanent disability. If this has caused you to be permanently unable to work, you may also request damages for lost earning potential, whether or not you were employed at the time of the accident.
- Loss of companionship. If a car accident victim died as the result of the crash, their loved ones could seek damages.
- Damage to your vehicle and any possessions that were damaged in the accident.
Do You Need to File a Lawsuit to Recover Damages?
Not necessarily. In many cases, we can secure a settlement from the insurance company. This is actually more common than going to court to settle a car accident claim. However, there are some circumstances where filing a lawsuit may be necessary:
- Insufficient insurance. Under Georgia law, motorists are only required to carry $25,000 in insurance. Some may have more than this, but not everyone does. Additionally, you may be involved in a crash with an uninsured driver. Even if the other driver has the minimum coverage, if your medical bills alone are in the six figures, $25,000 isn’t going to be close to compensating you for the other driver’s negligence. In these types of situations, you may need to file a lawsuit against the party you believe is responsible for the accident.
- A settlement can’t be reached. Sometimes the insurance company disagrees with the amount you’re seeking or with their obligation to pay. In this case, it may be necessary to sue the insurance company.
- If a third party is also responsible. Less commonly, an accident may be caused not by either driver but by a third party such as a car manufacturer. For example, maybe you bought a new car, and a few weeks later, your brakes inexplicably failed, causing you to crash. Or, the accident may have been caused by one or both drivers, but your injuries were made worse by some defect in your car, like an airbag that didn’t deploy. In this type of situation, you may have a case against a third party.
If the Insurance Company Has Already Made An Offer, Do You Still Need a Car Accident Attorney in Atlanta?
Yes. Many people make the mistake of thinking they only need a lawyer if they want to file a lawsuit. Unfortunately, this is not true. If an insurance company has made you an offer after an accident, it’s very important that you discuss your case and their offer with an experienced attorney before accepting or declining it. There are several reasons for this.
One difficulty you may run into with an offer is that an insurance adjuster’s job is to save as much money as possible for the insurance company. This means paying out as little as possible. Sometimes that may mean refusing to pay a claim entirely, but other times it means offering the claimant less than their claim is really worth. In some cases, the adjuster may call and make you an offer while you’re still in the hospital dealing with your injuries. At this point, you probably haven’t seen the hospital bills yet and have no idea what you’ll owe. You also probably don’t know how much more care you’ll need. Will you need one follow-up appointment with your doctor or six over the next year? Will you need another operation if you don’t recover as well as you hoped? How long will you need to be in physical therapy?
Most people don’t know the answers to these questions until days, weeks, or even months after their accident. Even your doctor may not be able to predict exactly how much care you’ll need, as people can recover at different rates, and not everyone responds to treatment in the exact same way. If you accept an insurance company’s offer without knowing what your total costs will be, you may not have enough money to cover your medical costs alone, let alone any of the other damages listed above.
Another potential issue is that insurance adjusters may call to talk about your settlement then start asking you questions about the accident. These may seem innocent, but the adjuster often tries to twist your words or get you to say something that can be construed as indicating the accident was your fault. Worse, this conversation could take place when you’re unable to think clearly because you’re either in pain from your injuries or taking strong medication for the pain. Keep in mind that you don’t have to talk to them the minute they call. If you’re in a lot of pain or groggy from painkillers, it may be helpful to let a trusted loved one screen your calls until you feel better. Otherwise, you can simply let the insurance adjuster’s calls go to voicemail until you’ve had a chance to speak with a lawyer.
Additionally, insurance adjusters can be pushy if they want you to accept a settlement. If you do answer the phone, they may want you to commit to accepting an offer right away. The best thing to do is ask them to send you the offer in writing and promise to read it and get back to them when you’re feeling up to it. Then hang up the phone and call an attorney. This serves two purposes: You won’t accept an offer without knowing if it’s reasonable, and you won’t be able to say anything the insurance company may use against you in the future.
Before making any decisions about a possible settlement, contact a personal injury lawyer for a free consultation to better understand what kind of damages you should be seeking. You may feel overwhelmed during these moments, but attorney Ali Awad, the CEO lawyer, is here to stand up for your legal rights. Don’t accept lowball offers, and don’t take insurers at face value. The benefit of having an experienced car crash lawyer on your side is that they can negotiate with the insurance company on your behalf if you realize the offer is too low. With the CEO Lawyer, you will not have to call the insurance company back and argue with them. Contact us online or call (833) 254-2923 to get started today.