pain and suffering from car accident

[nikoheartsu]

Nov 20th i was involved in a car accident in which a woman ran a red light and t-boned my car. My car ended up being totaled. I'm now in contact with the woman's insurance and they want to give me 500 dollars for pain and suffering. Personally I find this insulting. At the time of the accident I was about 5 months pregnant, and had my 4year old son in the car with me. My son was not injured but was extremely shook up. As for me, I had no serious injuries, only heavy bruising on my chest, minor bruising on my side, and minor scrapes, scratches, and cuts on my arm, legs, and feet. I went to the hospital and was monitored and xrayed to make sure I was okay and my pregnancy was okay. I did end up with a bladder infection brought on by post traumatic stress, but no serious problems. I missed 2 days work from the accident, had swelling, stiffness, and severe sorness for about a month afterwards. I was also extremely stressed out by the accident and the total loss of my transportation.

I'm not sure what a reasonable amount would be for pain and suffering, but I'm positive 500 dollars is not nearly enough. Does anyone out there have an idea or educated guess on what amount would be more appropriate for what I've gone through?

[Michaelm71]

I'm not a lawyer or any sort but the best advice I can give you is don't be too frugal. Even if you have no intention to hire a lawyer, see one just for consultation so that you get an idea of how much your case is worth. Assuming lawyers in where you live follows the same custom as where I live, they won't charge you a penny for initial consultation. Normally session would last for about 30min ~ 1 hour. For those who ask for fee, it is just around $200/hr. It's well worth it considering the amount you would lost from lack of knowledge. In addition to that, you need to act very fast due to the fact that some countries have regulation which allows claimants to ask compensation within limited period of time only. So I strongly suggest you to see one as soon as possible. I wish you and you son best of luck.

Get a lawyer for accidents like Marcus and Levi.

[bweb4sale]

all you want to do is to get a good lawyer so that they can defend your side.

thank you all for your advice. we still haven't settled, now it seems to be taking the insurance company months just to get my medical bills and they want to wait til that happens before talking about numbers. they know for sure that i wont settle for a lousy 500 bucks though. i think i'll look through the phone book tomorrow and find lawyers in my area that do the whole free consultation thing- its a good idea. i deff can't afford a lawyer through the whole thing so a free consultation sounds perfect for me.