Are there things I should know before a car accident happened?
Below are some considerations to improve your protection before a car accident:
1. The owner of the car involved is liable to pay for all damages if you let anyone else drive it. If you let a friend drive your car, whom you know to be a risky or speeding driver, you can blame the friend as much as you want, but in law you may be made liable to pay under your insurance. And if the damages are catastrophic and are more than what you may have bought for insurance (usually $1 million coverage), your personal assets will be at risk. You will be at risk of losing your house if you owned one, for example. Two things you can consider doing to protect yourself: do not lend your car to a risky driver and understand the risks you are assuming. You may also consider purchasing additional liability coverage from $1 million to $2 million (the cost is about $50 per year for the average owner), or umbrella coverage (to increase to about $5 million) when you may have bought home and auto insurance together with the same insurer (the cost is about $300 to $500 per year).
2. An owner of the car involved may lose the right to sue for pain and suffering if he or she drove the car without insurance. It is estimated that there are about 10% of drivers who drive without insurance. If they owned the cars involved but did not insure them, they may be legally barred from starting a lawsuit for their damages regardless of how serious the injuries may be. Do not drive without insurance: you may ruin your own claims, in addition to having to pay for any damages to others personally.
3. One of the ways to protect yourself and your family against someone who drives with no insurance or only with the minimum insurance required by law ($200,000) is to purchase the Family Protection Coverage option with your broker or insurance company (which costs about $30 a year). This will bring the amount available to pay yourself or your certain family members and relatives living with you up to the same amount of liability coverage you bought ($1 million, $2 million, or $5 million discussed above).
4. Another way of protecting you or your family before a car accident is to review your disability insurance and consider whether you should buy extra "optional coverage" for auto accident no-fault benefits. No-fault benefits have been greatly reduced since 2016 in Ontario but you may buy to increase the coverage. Who may benefit from buying this option coverage? If you have high income (say, above $75,000 annually) but do not have any other private disability insurance or long-term disability benefits through your employer's group insurance, it may be difficult and expensive to now buy private insurance directly by yourself, especially if you are now middle-aged or have medical conditions which make the costs or premiums very high as to be inaccessible. Then you might want to consider increasing the income loss coverage on your auto insurance policy so that in the event of an auto accident (which is probably the most frequent cause of personal injuries and income loss), you may have a higher income loss benefit even if you are at fault for the accident. Discuss with your auto insurance broker or your auto insurance company. The premium may be far more affordable than buying a private disability insurance - although a private disability insurance policy may have greater basic coverage in that it also covers losses due to sickness and other non-auto causes.
5. Be accurate and honest in dealing with insurance matters with your company. If you are not honest in certain matters relating to your insurance, an insurance company may refuse to honour the insurance coverage under the law, or it may reduce coverage all the way down to only $200,000 regardless of how much coverage you may have bought. Under the law, the parties to an insurance contract must deal with each other in utmost good faith, in order for it to be fair and possible for an insurer to assess the risks and the premiums in return for fairly protecting you. If you lied or were not honest, it would not be fair to make an insurer pay for what it had not fairly bargained for. In a way, you will be punished under the law. On the other hand, an insurer will also be punished if after an accident, it dealt with you in bad faith. In personal injury cases, the largest punishment award in Canada against an insurance company for bad conduct alone is $750,000 plus interest of nearly $750,000, totaling $1.5 million. This is on top of the benefits which were found to be improperly denied by the company. The law takes the duty of utmost good faith by both parties very seriously.
6. Be accurate in dealing with a small car accident. Honesty is the best protection. In the case of a small accident, if you are not hurt or injured, or if the pain and problems are completely resolved within one week without any lingering small effects, you should consider discussing with your insurer whether a claim should be opened. If you decide to make a claim, then be completely honest about your symptoms and your recovery. If you only feel a small problem remaining, describe the small problem accurately. The details of your claim from this small accident would be likely produced and analyzed in the unfortunate event that you subsequently are involved in a more serious accident. The inaccuracies from the small accident may negatively affect your subsequent serious accident. Any inconsistencies may impair your credibility which in turn affects the strength of your claims, or reduce the amount of compensation you may deserve.
7. Be accurate in filling out applications for disability benefits before an accident. Similar to above, if you lied or were inaccurate in your application for disability benefits (LTD, CPP, Ontario Works, ODSP ...) as to exaggerate your pre-existing disability, that may hurt your future accident claims because your credibility and accuracy are called into question. There are ways to try to rehabilitate these inconsistencies or minimize their impact. One of them is to be honest and make accurate corrections at the first reasonable opportunity.
Below are some considerations to improve your protection before a car accident:
1. The owner of the car involved is liable to pay for all damages if you let anyone else drive it. If you let a friend drive your car, whom you know to be a risky or speeding driver, you can blame the friend as much as you want, but in law you may be made liable to pay under your insurance. And if the damages are catastrophic and are more than what you may have bought for insurance (usually $1 million coverage), your personal assets will be at risk. You will be at risk of losing your house if you owned one, for example. Two things you can consider doing to protect yourself: do not lend your car to a risky driver and understand the risks you are assuming. You may also consider purchasing additional liability coverage from $1 million to $2 million (the cost is about $50 per year for the average owner), or umbrella coverage (to increase to about $5 million) when you may have bought home and auto insurance together with the same insurer (the cost is about $300 to $500 per year).
2. An owner of the car involved may lose the right to sue for pain and suffering if he or she drove the car without insurance. It is estimated that there are about 10% of drivers who drive without insurance. If they owned the cars involved but did not insure them, they may be legally barred from starting a lawsuit for their damages regardless of how serious the injuries may be. Do not drive without insurance: you may ruin your own claims, in addition to having to pay for any damages to others personally.
3. One of the ways to protect yourself and your family against someone who drives with no insurance or only with the minimum insurance required by law ($200,000) is to purchase the Family Protection Coverage option with your broker or insurance company (which costs about $30 a year). This will bring the amount available to pay yourself or your certain family members and relatives living with you up to the same amount of liability coverage you bought ($1 million, $2 million, or $5 million discussed above).
4. Another way of protecting you or your family before a car accident is to review your disability insurance and consider whether you should buy extra "optional coverage" for auto accident no-fault benefits. No-fault benefits have been greatly reduced since 2016 in Ontario but you may buy to increase the coverage. Who may benefit from buying this option coverage? If you have high income (say, above $75,000 annually) but do not have any other private disability insurance or long-term disability benefits through your employer's group insurance, it may be difficult and expensive to now buy private insurance directly by yourself, especially if you are now middle-aged or have medical conditions which make the costs or premiums very high as to be inaccessible. Then you might want to consider increasing the income loss coverage on your auto insurance policy so that in the event of an auto accident (which is probably the most frequent cause of personal injuries and income loss), you may have a higher income loss benefit even if you are at fault for the accident. Discuss with your auto insurance broker or your auto insurance company. The premium may be far more affordable than buying a private disability insurance - although a private disability insurance policy may have greater basic coverage in that it also covers losses due to sickness and other non-auto causes.
5. Be accurate and honest in dealing with insurance matters with your company. If you are not honest in certain matters relating to your insurance, an insurance company may refuse to honour the insurance coverage under the law, or it may reduce coverage all the way down to only $200,000 regardless of how much coverage you may have bought. Under the law, the parties to an insurance contract must deal with each other in utmost good faith, in order for it to be fair and possible for an insurer to assess the risks and the premiums in return for fairly protecting you. If you lied or were not honest, it would not be fair to make an insurer pay for what it had not fairly bargained for. In a way, you will be punished under the law. On the other hand, an insurer will also be punished if after an accident, it dealt with you in bad faith. In personal injury cases, the largest punishment award in Canada against an insurance company for bad conduct alone is $750,000 plus interest of nearly $750,000, totaling $1.5 million. This is on top of the benefits which were found to be improperly denied by the company. The law takes the duty of utmost good faith by both parties very seriously.
6. Be accurate in dealing with a small car accident. Honesty is the best protection. In the case of a small accident, if you are not hurt or injured, or if the pain and problems are completely resolved within one week without any lingering small effects, you should consider discussing with your insurer whether a claim should be opened. If you decide to make a claim, then be completely honest about your symptoms and your recovery. If you only feel a small problem remaining, describe the small problem accurately. The details of your claim from this small accident would be likely produced and analyzed in the unfortunate event that you subsequently are involved in a more serious accident. The inaccuracies from the small accident may negatively affect your subsequent serious accident. Any inconsistencies may impair your credibility which in turn affects the strength of your claims, or reduce the amount of compensation you may deserve.
7. Be accurate in filling out applications for disability benefits before an accident. Similar to above, if you lied or were inaccurate in your application for disability benefits (LTD, CPP, Ontario Works, ODSP ...) as to exaggerate your pre-existing disability, that may hurt your future accident claims because your credibility and accuracy are called into question. There are ways to try to rehabilitate these inconsistencies or minimize their impact. One of them is to be honest and make accurate corrections at the first reasonable opportunity.