This might be the most important thing you read today, but it may also be the most boring.
Nobody likes to discuss car insurance, so I’ll keep it short. You need UM/UIM car insurance on your policy! It could save you and your family…
Let me explain: So many people in Florida think they have “full coverage”. That phrase is so misused it has almost no meaning. When you buy car insurance you’re actually buying about five different types of insurance. “PIP” – will pay your medical bills if you’re injured in a car crash. “Bodily Injury” – if you’re at fault and the other driver is injured, this will protect you financially from a claim. “Collision” – will pay for car repairs. “Medical payments” – will pay for more medical bills than just PIP. And “Uninsured Motorist Coverage” – without question UM is critical coverage to get, yet it is the most optional.
Figure that out! The most important insurance to cover you and your family is also pretty easy to waive. And many families do waive the coverage to save some money. Do not assume you have it. Go check.
UM will cover you and your family financially in the event you are in a car crash, you suffer a permanent injury AND the other at-fault driver has no car insurance. Working in the area of personal injury for more than twenty years, I cannot tell you how many clients I’ve had to turn down because the person who crashed into them did not have any insurance at all, and my client didn’t have any UM coverage as backup.
“But I have to have car insurance, why don’t they?” Florida can be a very transient state with people moving into and out of areas pretty quickly and it’s easy to trick the DMV when someone buys a policy of car insurance to register their car and then they just fail to make any additional payments. Then they crash into you and leave you holding the bag full of injuries and damages.
Another good thing UM can do: If the other driver did have a policy of car insurance but it wasn’t enough to fully cover your damages and injuries, your UM might pay you benefits over and above what the other company has paid you. That’s UIM – Underinsured Motorist coverage.
In a time when medical costs continue to escalate, when most working people are two or three paychecks away from being broke and when a personal injury might keep you out of work for weeks or months on end, I think you can now see just how important UM/UIM insurance is.
That wasn’t too painful, was it? Now go check your car insurance policy……..I’ll wait……..