How to Deal With an Insurance Adjuster After a Car Accident

Posted in Car Accidents on July 12, 2023

When a vehicle accident occurs, individuals will typically go through their insurance carriers to recover any compensation they may be owed. If an accident was caused by the negligent actions of another party, victims will report the claim to their insurance carrier and will also likely have to speak to the insurance claims adjuster for the at-fault party’s insurance carrier. 

When you receive a call from an insurance claims adjuster after an accident, there are various things that you need to keep in mind in order to help protect yourself and your claim.

The Claims Adjuster is Not Your Friend

Please understand that the insurance claims adjuster is not your friend. One thing we can almost guarantee is that the claims adjuster will be incredibly friendly over the phone. They will seem like your “everyday person,” perhaps even someone you would like to chat with. However, insurance claims adjusters have one goal – to limit how much compensation they pay you for a claim.

Do not be taken in by any friendliness or casual conversation started by the insurance claims adjuster. This is designed to get you to lower your guard and open up about the incident.

Be Cautious About What You Say

We will never encourage individuals to lie to insurance claims adjusters. What we do encourage is for individuals to limit how much conversation they have with the insurance carriers involved. Claimants need to stick with the truth and keep their story clear each time they tell it, but the reality is that injury victims should contact an attorney and have their attorney speak to the insurance carrier.

Even seemingly innocuous conversations could jeopardize an injury claim. For example, a claims adjuster could start a conversation about football. This could lead to a conversation about your kids playing football and how you recently went to see their game. Even though this may seem like an innocent conversation, the claims adjuster could find out that the game happened shortly after your accident when you should not have been going anywhere, per your doctor’s instructions, due to your injuries.

In other words, no small talk with the insurance carrier.

Refer Questions to Your Lawyer 

When you are making your initial claim with an insurance carrier, all they need to know is the basic facts. This includes information about where the incident occurred, the names and contact information of those involved, and that you are seeking medical treatment for your injuries. They do not need to know anything beyond that. All other questions should be referred to your Seattle car accident attorney.

Keep Social Media Quiet

Jumping on social media to post about everyday life is almost second nature to many of us now. Inherently, there is nothing wrong with doing that. However, after an injury claim occurs, you need to assume that your entire life will be an open book. Insurance claims adjusters and attorneys for the other side will almost certainly examine your social media. Even if you think your social media accounts are private, all it takes is one person sharing or screenshotting your status in order for your information to get out into the public.

We encourage individuals to post nothing on social media while their claim is ongoing. This includes not only information about the accident and the recovery process but also posts about everyday life. These other posts could be taken out of context and used against the claimant.