Personal Injury Lawyers in Delaware County: What Your Claim Is Actually Worth

The two-year deadline, and the exceptions that matter

Pennsylvania gives you two years from the date of injury to file most personal injury lawsuits. Miss it and the claim is gone, however strong it was.

Three situations change that arithmetic and they come up more often than people expect. A claim against a government body, a township, a city, SEPTA, usually requires formal written notice within six months, long before the two years is up. A claim on behalf of a child generally does not start running until they turn eighteen. And an injury that was not discoverable at the time, some toxic exposures and some surgical errors, may run from when you knew or should have known.

If you are anywhere near two years, the answer is not to research it further. It is to call today.

Full tort and limited tort, the choice you probably do not remember making

This is the single most consequential thing on a Pennsylvania auto policy and most people select it once, at a kitchen table, years before it matters.

Limited tort is cheaper, which is why so many people have it. It is not the end of the claim. There are recognized exceptions: injuries that qualify as serious impairment of a bodily function, being struck by a driver convicted of DUI, being hit by an out of state vehicle, and being a passenger in certain circumstances. Whether your injury clears the threshold is an argument, and it is one worth having rather than conceding.

Send us your declarations page. We will tell you which one you have and what it means for your case.

How a claim is actually valued

Nobody can give you a number on a first call, and anybody who does is guessing to get you signed. The inputs are these:

• Medical costs, including the treatment you will still need. Settling before you know that is how people end up short.
• Lost income, past and future, including work you can no longer do at all.
• Permanence. An injury that resolves in eight weeks and an injury you carry for thirty years are not the same claim.
• The policies available. The at-fault driver’s limits, your own underinsured motorist coverage, and sometimes a commercial policy behind a company vehicle. This is often where the real money is, and it is the part people miss.
• Comparative negligence. Pennsylvania reduces your recovery by your share of fault, and bars it entirely if you are more than 50 percent responsible. Insurers push hard on this early.

What to do in the first week

1. Get treated, and tell the provider how it happened. A record that does not connect the injury to the incident is the first thing a carrier attacks.
2. Report it. A police report for a crash, an incident report for a fall on commercial property.
3. Photograph everything while it still looks like it did: the scene, the vehicle, the hazard, the injury.
4. Write down witnesses. Names and numbers disappear within days.
5. Do not give a recorded statement to the other side’s insurer. You are not required to, and its purpose is not to help you.

The adjuster who calls in the first 48 hours

They will be pleasant. They may offer to handle your rental, or send a cheque that seems reasonable against the bills you have so far.

The bills you have so far are not the claim. A first offer arrives before anybody knows whether you need surgery, and accepting it closes the file permanently. There is no reopening it when the shoulder does not improve.

You are allowed to say that you are not discussing the claim yet and to ask them to put their request in writing. That sentence costs you nothing and protects a great deal.

What it costs to hire us

Nothing up front, and nothing at all unless we recover for you. The fee is a percentage of the recovery, agreed in writing before we start, and we will walk you through every deduction from a settlement before you sign it. If we do not think you have a claim worth bringing, we will tell you on the first call.