Legal Question in Personal Injury in California

Re: undocumented immigrant drove car into me on motercycle

Nice try, no brass ring. Either you timely paid and got coverage, or you didn't. Most insurance policies generally have a 30 day grace period for automatic reinstatement upon payment, but once that time expires all you can do is try to appeal the cancellation. However, no reinstatement would be allowed after the 30 day grace period when there is a pending uncovered claim. Withholding that info would be insurance fraud, and the claim would be denied anyway. There are risks and consequences to all our actions, whether intended or not.

Now you understand why I 'preach' to all in earshot to have substantial insurance coverage [min 100/300 if not higher], with full UM/UIM coverage at the same level. It is only a few dollars a year more to have that UM/UIM coverage. Without UM, you are risking total financial destruction if you are seriously injured and incapacitated by an uninsured driver. Think red light runner broadsiding you at 60 MPH. I've seen CHP estimates that more than 25% of the drivers are uninsured in CA. How lucky do you feel?

Re: undocumented immigrant drove car into me on motercycle

Your only recourse is to try to sue the guy in small claims court and hope you can serve him and hope you can find him and then even if you win, you'll have nothing. The length of time you are with your ins. co. means nothing--they could care less about you. Obviously, if you got your policy reinstated to include the date of loss, that would be nice but then if you signed the um coverage waiver, you'd still have no UM coverage. You made a lot of mistakes all around and knowing what's going on in So.CA, you should have been more attentive to your policy payments.