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How Our Firm Helped an Insurance Adjuster¹

Insurance adjusters – at some point after a car accident, you’re going to eventually talk to one in order to settle your claims. Their job is to make vital decisions about how much money you get as reimbursement for the damages you suffered during an accident. While some insurance adjusters may be very nice people, their job is to have their employer’s best interests in mind, which usually means decreasing or minimizing how much the insurance company has to pay out to you.

Outside of their job, they’re just ordinary humans trying to pay their bills, put food on the table, and get ready for the next day. So what happens when it’s the insurance adjuster in the shoes of the victim?

This is the story of Ben B.

Insurance Adjuster by Day, Student by Night

Ben B. is a part-time graduate student whose day job is working for a large, well-known insurance company. Interestingly, Ben is a liability adjuster for car accidents, like the one he was in. He did not buy coverage from his insurance employer because even with his employee discount, their insurance was still too expensive.

Before the collision, Ben was at peak fitness level, but the injuries he sustained left him unable to do much in the way of working out and other strenuous activities.

Around Thanksgiving, Ben was taking his dog to the vet and drove forward after the light turned green. All of a sudden, a car rammed into the side of his car and t-boned him on the driver’s side. Ben was thrown around as the impact deployed the airbags. As he looked around, confused, terrified, and in shock, he noted that his light was indeed green and he hadn’t done anything wrong. The police and the paramedics came. Ben watched as the woman who caused the collision was picked up from the accident scene by her cousin.

Ben went to the hospital for treatment, and he filed a claim with his insurance. The woman in the other car admitted that she had run a red light. However, her insurance was trying to say that she had no permission to use the car as it was her cousin’s car – the same cousin that Ben observed picking the woman up from the scene.

As an insurance adjuster who understands insurance company strategies, Ben knew exactly what was happening.

If the other party’s insurance successfully argued that the woman took the keys to the car or didn’t have permission from her cousin to use it – that the car was technically “stolen” – then they could keep delaying the claims process.

Perhaps fortunately for him this time, Ben is all too familiar with the delay, deny, defend tactic that many insurance companies often take. He knew that:

1. The other party was trying to delay the process,
2. The cousin whose car was “stolen” would likely not press charges against their own relative who caused the accident, and
3. Ben would then be stuck with thousands of dollars’ worth of hospital and doctor’s bills to pay off

When Insurance Adjusters Lawyer Up

A week and a half went by, and Ben heard nothing from the other party. Meanwhile, he had no car to get to work and school, his finals were about to start, and he was having to regularly go to doctor’s appointments. With Ben already juggling so many balls, all of which were up in the air, he also had to add in an uncooperative insurance company. Something had to give.

And so, after seeing the James Scott Farrin commercial on TV, Ben decided to call us.

“I deal with lawyers a lot. I’ll be honest, I was told by my [insurance company employer] not to talk to [a lawyer], but I called and spoke to you guys and I felt like you guys were really trying to help me. And that’s really what I needed in the moment.”

“I Just Didn’t Have Time to Wait”

Ben understands that settling a claim can take a long time, but acknowledges that insurance companies are prone to dragging a claim out so that it takes longer than it needs to be. And many people choose to settle instead of fighting for the compensation they actually deserve.

Ben just wanted to get his case settled and get the whole ordeal behind him sooner rather than later. However, most importantly, he didn’t want to leave with any sort of debt from the accident when he was so clearly not at fault.

“Based on my experience and background as a liability adjuster, I know that the adjuster on my case was just extending the process because they didn’t want to make a decision on my claim. I know these things. But I was just like, ‘I don’t want to deal with this; I just don’t have the time.’

A lot of insurance companies aren’t the best and they’ll try to get you on little things, and I know how to talk to them because they’ll try to shift blame on you even when it’s not your fault.”

A Gigantic Weight Off of Ben’s Shoulders

When asked what Ben thought of his experience working with our firm, he said, “The Farrin legal team was so helpful. They were always very responsive. They wrote things down exactly so that I understood it 100%. Because I mean, I do work in insurance, but health insurance is still something that’s very confusing. It’s a whole different world from auto insurance, so the legal team was really able to break that down in ways that were really helpful – like helping me understand my coverage and what I had to pay per my policy.”

Ben’s legal team took charge of collecting all of his documents related to treatment to present as evidence to the defendant’s insurance company, and then negotiated a settlement with them on Ben’s behalf.

The case settled very favorably.¹

Ben said, “I was happy with the settlement. I was surprised – I got more than I expected to get back, and on top of that, all of my bills were paid. So it was an exciting thing.”¹Ben is healing and feeling much better. He has his mobility back and is almost back to normal, with zero debts from his treatments.

According to Ben, the team at Farrin took the legal burden off of his shoulders when he was already juggling so many things in his life. From his first call to the firm, the people Ben talked to “really seemed like they cared and sounded like they knew what they were doing and talking about; just very knowledgeable. Even though it is a bigger firm, it sounded like you guys would take care of my case and help me…

And that’s just what I really needed.”