Legal Question in Insurance Law in Texas

Re: Rental Vehicle accident - Who's liable

We can't be certain what a policy covers without reading the policy.

Having said that, your policy probably doesn't cover your friend's liability, but his own policy probably does.

Liability and coverage are really two separate concepts. Liability means whether the injured party can get a judgment against you. Coverage means whether your insurance company must pay that judgment. If there is coverage, your insurance company has a duty to defend you. In fact, your insurance company may have a duty to defend you if there is even a serious question of liability.

Some insurance companies will deny coverage if they think there is a question of coverage. Some will deny coverage if they think they can get away with it. This is more likely to happen if the insured does not have an attorney. Once the insurance company sees there is an attorney on the other side, they tend to become much more reasonable.

It may well be that a few hours of an attorney's time will pay big dividends. Of course, you want to keep everything in perspective. If you are only talking about a few hundred dollars of property damage and no other claims, it's not worth hiring an attorney.

If you have any further questions, please feel free to email me or give me a call at (626) 744-7787.