It appears as though recently, a number of the major automobile liability insurance carriers have taken a stronger than usual defensive posture on attempting to settle lawsuits – if that is possible. In particular, we are talking about what appears to be the common business practice of GEICO, Progressive and Mercury Insurance companies, in the state of Florida. It seems as though these insurance carriers are offering ridiculously low settlement offers when a Fort Lauderdale, Florida personal injury claim is presented by way of a presuit demand package.
It is apparent that these particular insurance companies are willing to tempt the personal injury claimant with an unreasonably low offer of settlement if suit hasn’t been filed. The question is do these insurance carriers perceive that these claimants will be willing to accept a settlement well below true value out of financial desperation caused by the seemingly, never ending recession that their sister industry-the banking world- has left these “two time” victims with.
From a practical standpoint, these insurance companies have presumably made a corporate decision to either test the financial wisdom of this strategy or already have the empirical data assembled that has justified this strategy. Once an insurance carrier decides a policy of across the board apparently low-balling settlement offers they must be willing to litigate more of their cases and absorb the cost, time and manpower involved in defending cases as well as absorbing the possibility of paying significantly more by way of judgments.
The other concern is whether these insurance companies have strategically reacted to the growing number of “high volume advertising personal injury firms” that may be willing to advise their clients to settle, way below value, because these firm’s volumes of cases will still produce profits for these types of firms, at the possible expense of individual clients.
A Fort Lauderdale personal injury victim should take great care in selecting the right Fort Lauderdale injury lawyers that are committed to obtaining the just amount of damages for each of their clients unlike those firms referenced herein above.
