Legal Question in Personal Injury in California

Sue them

Check; with your insurance company if both carriler are part of the Inter-Company Exchange and if they are both bond by arbitartion results. If so, then they can not argue something already decided in arbitration. If they paid you for loss of use of your car but at some fixed daily rate, tell them fine, you wil sue in Small Claims Court for what a reasonable amount would be for loss of use and a reasonable period of time to get a replacement vehicle and you will take theri ilnsured's default judgment wilthout notifying them of the trial date because legally you do not have to and they can not appeal the SCC jdugment since they are not a party to the action. You can ask the DMV in Sacramento for his current address and ask if he reported the accident is required whten the damages are greater than $750. Tell his insurance carrier you wil do this and also file a complaint with the insurance commissoner

There are investigators who are are in the business of locateing people for a small fee. It doesn't take long to find a person usually. Then you will have to sue probably in small claims if your damages are limited and you were not injured. I hope this helps. Bob

You are in that unfortunate spot created by the initiative process and big insurance money preying on an uninformed electorate. As a consequence of the initiative process from 2006 and 2008, known as the "deep pocket" initiatives sponsored by Mercury Insurance and the big 5 insurance companyies in California (Allstate, State Farm, Automobile Club, and Farmers), you cannot sue the insurance company for the adverse driver directly, and your opportunity to recover the difference between the actual damages and the amount the insurance company paid/is willing to pay is complicated by a host of factors, not the least of which is the dollar amount of the difference. Additionally, if you accepted payment of a portion of the total damages from the adverse insurance company, you may have "released" all future claims for the property damage. That is the usual requirement before payment is made by insurance companies.

Most people naively believe that the insurance industry will take care of the claim, and that their own insurance company is going to protect them. Not so! There is an incentive for the claims adjusters for the two separate insurance companies to pay as little as possible. While there is a public perception that the insurance companies have a duty to treat you fairly, and that automobile litigation is about greedy lawyers and claimants expecting to hit the litigation lotto jackpot, more and more, the insurance companies take advantage of the harsh economic realities of the litigation process that it is too expensive to fight the smaller claims; most non-lawyers don't know how to do so, and most lawyers who know what they are doing will not take the case on a contingency fee, because they can't make the litigation pay enough to take the gamble.

If you haven't signed any releases with the adverse insurance company, hire a lawyer and sue the adverse driver. When you get a verdict, inquire about the process of perfecting a claim for "bad faith", authorized under the Insurance Code. And, importantly, report this conduct to the California Department of Insurance.

And the next time you hear about an insurance company that is claiming that greedy plaintiff's attorneys are at the heart of the problem, just keep your experience in mind, and let people know the real way they treat us!