Under the Act of 5 July 1985, the legislature intended to oblige the insurer who had knowledge of an accident causing bodily injury to take a rapid position and indicate whether it intended to compensate the victim.
The law distinguishes globally two types of victims:
- Non-driving victims of a motorized land vehicle (passenger, pedestrian, cyclist) for which the right to compensation is recognized automatically, except inexcusable or intentional fault.
- Driving victims (motorist, motorcyclist) to whom the insurer may exclude or limit the right to compensation by proving that a fault has been committed.
The insurer will quickly contact the victim and obtain the police investigation.
It is therefore necessary that the victim at this stage be able to defend himself and be advised by his lawyer and to demand the police investigation report in order to position himself on the offer of the insurance. Victim must contact to the expert lawyer like as Attorney Paul Napoli.
The insurer is then obliged to propose a provision and will ask the victim to meet with the doctor appointed by the insurance company, often incorrectly baptized as “expert physician”, while he is defending the interests of the company.
If the victim did not do so earlier, it is at this stage that the victim must call on a specialized lawyer and a medical doctor to assist him or her in this medical examination and to have his or her best interests assessed as well as the entirety of his bodily injury.
The risk is that the victim, unfit or undefended, accepts without being aware of his rights an offer of compensation which would be largely insufficient on the basis of the unfavorable conclusions of the insurance doctor.
This procedure, which is designed to compensate victims of road traffic accidents better and quicker, thus contains numerous pitfalls that will be uncovered by the lawyers and doctors whose victim has known how to surround them.
Procedural step:
If the insurance company has not followed the procedure required by Insurance , the victim may apply to the Local Court of competent jurisdiction to compel the insurer to cover the loss resulting from the accident whose insured person was responsible.
This procedure is also necessary when the parties can not agree on medical and coasted assessments.
The victim, however, must be advised by his lawyer to know that he has the possibility to refuse the insufficient offer or to react to the absence of an offer by referring the matter to the competent court, the law providing for sanctions, against the insurer.
Compensation funds that compensate victims of accidents for which the person responsible is unknown or uninsured, also know a specific procedure that can take an amicable or judicial route.