Legal Question in Insurance Law in Oregon

Re: Responsibility of under age drivers

Yes, there are some additional things you could do to protect yourself more. First, don't ever use HIS truck. Second, get a TOTALLY separate insurance policy, not just one that's under the main one -- although I'm not sure how much difference THAT might make.

The BEST thing you can do is to be sure you and your son have VERY HIGH LIABILITY LIMITS -- as high as you can find for a 16 year-old kid. Not less than $100k per person liability coverage, in my opinion; and MORE if you can find and afford it.

When you do that, by the way, they ordinarily ALSO raise the UNINSURED (UM) and UNDERINSURED (UIM) MOTORIST coverage, which protects HIM, as well as his passengers, not only from uninsured and underinsured motorists while HE is driving his truck; it protects him if he's a pedestrian or bicyclist or passenger in another car, and he's hurt by someone without enough insurance to pay his damages. He could then have a much larger pool of money available, if, god forbid, he should be hurt that badly.

When one has such a large claim, whether it's against another driver or against one's own company for UM, you still should, in my opinion, have a lawyer to choke the money out of them, since the UM adjusters then assume the role of the adverse carrier, although the really GOOD ones will hide that from you until it's too late. That's a reason to have a lawyer in any serious case, UM or not.

In any event, high policy limits is the best protection.

Also, CAVEAT: I have not researched your question carefully, so you are getting an off-the-cuff response, which you ought to take with a grain of salt for that reason. Also, this is largely a matter of state law, and my thoughts are addressed to Oregon law. But, again, none of it matters, if you have high enough policy limits to pay the injured party. See if it's not horribly expensive to get a half-million or so in liability coverage. An umbrella policy could be in order, I'd shop around. You might find that expanding the basic policy up to at least $500k liability and UM/UIM does NOT cost all that much more!

Good luck,

Sam Hochberg