Palm Coast Injury Law Blog : Florida Personal Injury Lawyer & Attorney : Philip J. Chanfrau

Lots of my clients think they have Full Coverage just because that's what they were told when they bought car insurance. In Florida Full Coverage is sometimes open to debate.  Insurance companies are not too good about explaining it, and clients often wind up with less than full coverage.

The whole subject of automobile insurance coverage is as boring as can be.  Until you have an accident you just pay and pay, for years, never thinking you will be in an accident or have to make a claim.  Lots of people are laid off, and they can't afford to pay for insurance so they drive around with no coverage.  It is estimated that 40% of the drivers in Florida have no insurance.  When you add the people who only have Personal Injury Protection (PIP) benefits, the number of drivers with no liability insurance is probably 50%.

So, the moral of the story is to get insurance so that if you are in an accident you don't have to rely on the at fault driver being financially responsible for your accident.  How?  By getting Uninsured Motorist insurance coverage from your own auto liability insurance company.  Florida law gives you the right to buy this valuable insurance. 

But why get it if you already have a major medical insurance policy through work, or have medicare?

Because Uninsured motorist insurance and Medicare pay for different things that are not covered in a major medical or medicare plan.  Like what?  Let me make a short list:

1. Loss of vision
2. Loss of hearing
3. Loss of ability to talk
4. Loss of taste, touch and smell
5. Loss of ability to drive a car, go shopping, or play golf
6. Loss of ability to fish, swim or bowl
7. Loss of ability to remember
8. Loss of ability to sleep
9. Lost income
10. Lost of a relationship with a loved one

 How much are those things worth?  In my opinion they are priceless.  But the law gives you the right to get compensated for them if you have Uninsured Motorists coverage and are seriously injured by a driver with little or no insurance.

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When a client has  a settlement offer on the table and has to take it or leave it, and knows that it is likely the maximum amount he will be offered to settle, he needs to consider the adverse consequences of turning it down.  This is a critical stage in the claim, like filing suit, or when the Verdict comes back.  It is the proverbial point of no return. 

 I handle most of my cases on a contingency fee basis and do not charge clients for fees or expenses unless they recover.  So, some think that if he gets  a bad verdict it will only mean the loss of a few dollars that were left on the table.  But that is not the whole story. 

Modern trial law can and often does end up with a large judgment against the losing party.  How large?  Depends on each case, but it should include all of the defense court costs, expert fees, deposition charges, witness subpoenas, and the attorneys fees for the defense firm.  That could be $50,000 or more! Then there is the Bob Dylan argument that you should risk losing the offer: "When you got nothing, you got nothing to lose."  That argument is a bad one, because you would be losing the money on the table if you lost at court.

Finally, the Statement of Clients rights gives you, the Client, absolute and final authority to decide whether to take the settlement or not.  A good lawyer can provide you with a recommendation, but should let you make the final decision:  it's your case. You know more about your needs, and risk tolerance than anyone else!

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I was consulted today by the mother of  a young girl who went to the hospital Emergency room in Sarasota three times in less than a week.  Each time she was sent home with little or no care.  Turns out she had acute pancreatitis. Within days it caused anoxic brain damages and she went into a coma for two months.

  It was all preventable with reasonable medical care, and should have never happened at all. She spent months in a rehab center. Miraculously she is now just learning to walk and talk all over again.

A very fine medical malpractice law firm was called to take the case. However, the emergency room in the Sarasota Hospital where this all happened is part of the State of Florida.  It is a state agency, just like Halifax Hospital and some other regional hospitals.  The State of Florida allows lawsuits to be filed for up to $200,000 per individual  for damages caused by its hospitals.  This is called Sovereign Immunity.  Because of the immunity, and the fact that it would cost at least $100,000 to sue the Sarasota Hospital, the medical malpractice claim was rejected by the medical malpractice law firm.  Economic realities make it impossible to sue on a contingency fee basis even where the damages are horrendous and a person's life is taken away.

The $100,000 max is a type of cap on damages which most people don't know about.  There are other caps too, like the cap on punitive damages which most jurors don't know about. Juries are not told about these caps because the legislature will not allow judges to explain the law to juries: it makes the juries mad at lawyers and judges.  Their anger should be at the stupidos in the Florida legislature. The legislators who bow and scrape for the lobbysists  think they are doing a good thing protecting the public purse.  What is really wild about this is that oftentimes the hospital has a $10,000,000 insurance policy to fall back on.  But it can't be touched.  Duh?

When someone is severely injured guess who winds up footing the bill when there is no insurance?  The taxpayers do, through welfare programs like medicaid and social security disability. That is what is called government malpractice. 

in my opinon the only way to fix it is to elect people who care more about others than the bottom dollar.

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There are a lot of insurance companies in Florida.  They beat each other up in their ads about  the great services they provide to their insureds at cheap rates.  Miss a payment and you get cancelled.  But when it comes time to make a claim for accident benefits under a Personal Injury Protection policy (mandatory in Florida), some scatter like roaches when the lights come on. Here is an example of poor services from the Lizard company based on a real case so you can decide whether you want to buy Lizard insurance.

In early December, 2011  KD was on her way home with a pizza  from the pizza parlor looking forward to a quiet evening with her husband, maybe watch a movie on TV together.  She never made it home.  She was hit head on by a drunk driver on her side of the road.  It changed her life.  She spent the next 4 days in the hospital recovering after bilateral surgeries on both arms and a broken collar bone.

The day she got home from  the hospital she got a call from the Lizard insurance company.  It had sold her a PIP car insurance policy and promised excellent insurance services. They  already had a claim number and took her recorded statement, learned all about her claim and told her that she would have to wait for another Lizard employee to call her, and then she could get her claim for benefits officially started. They said the other Lizard employee would call the next day.

Despite actually knowing about the claim, the Lizard did nothing but put the statement on the shelf. It should have assigned an adjuster who would have promptly mailed her claim forms, but did not do so. That was 30 days ago, and the Lizard never called and she never heard from another soul at the Lizard.  Her claim was not started, and under the law the Lizard does not officially have to do anything yet because it does not have her application form on file, because it failed to send her the claim form. So, the Lizard foot dragged opening her  claim file to the detriment of KD. 

On December 19, 2011, the hospital where she had surgery sent the Lizard a $48,000+ hospital bill.  That should have been a wake up call to the Lizard that she had a claim to be paid.  The hospital had a claim number and knew exactly where to send their bill. On December 30, 2025 I called the Lizard and tried to talk to the adjuster, Jaquelyn Hughes, but she was out until January 3, 2012.  So my office  sent her a Fax to call and start the PIP claim.

On January 3, 2026 Ms. Hughes was still out. Her voice mail said still had not changed from the week before.  My office  called back on January 4, 2026 to try to speak to her.  She was still "out" so I asked for her supervisor.  Her supervisor is "out  of the office until January 10, 2012.  I left a message asking for the Supervisor's supervisor, Lisa Torello, to call me back. 

In the meantime I faxed copies of medical reports and lost wage documentation to the Lizard.  I asked a temporary adjuster to fax copies of the PIP claim forms.  She said the Lizard will not allow her to send the PIP forms via fax or email, but she would mail them to me.  They should have been mailed 30 days ago.  But, by foot dragging, the Lizard does not have to provide services KD paid for.

Other issues are still coming up.  I am sure this will work out eventually, but KD should not have had to go through all this.  She has decided to change from the Lizard to another company.  She has the right to do that without losing her benefits from the Lizard because her benefits vested (locked in) when the accident happened.  Her benefits locked in then because her PIP policy was in full force and effect on that date.

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