Personal Injury Suit Settled

[anonymuse]

I finally got my personal injury suit settled. Needless to say, it was a mess. Without going into much detail, after stating that it was within the statute of limitations they changed their mind and said it was not. But, they still offered me a "good faith" (read low-balled me) settlement of $10K.

The health insurance company has a lien for $4K on the amount. I have to total up all of medical bills relating to this accident that I have outstanding and pay them off. Hopefully, I'll have enough left (and a little left over) to finally file my BK. But what little that is, I want to spend on necessity things like new prescription eye glasses, a dentist visit, and an inversion table.

I'm fortunate that Colorado holds the proceeds from a personal injury settlement as exempt in a BK. I'm opening a separate checking account at a different bank so that I don't comingle any funds.

I'll ask my lawyer next week; however, I was wondering if anyone has any suggestions on paying back the creditors and/or credit agencies? Can I just write regular checks, or do you think I should get cashier's checks? Anything with the credit agencies that might help clean-up my credit history?

Also, anyone know any legitimate reason on how I could talk the health insurance company into accepting less? (It's so frustrating knowing how much work I put into this claim with documentation and physician's letters and they get theirs first.)

[HHM]

Why would you payback any creditors? I don't understand that part of your question?

First, clarify for me, who has the lien, the "health care providers", or your "health insurance company" who paid your health care providers. If its your insurance company, you probably won't make much headway. What you should do is demand an accurate accounting of what was actually paid out by the insurance company. With Health Care Providers, you can generally negotiate them down to what they would typically accept if the patient had medical insurance. (i.e. there is a difference between what Dr's charge uninsured and insured patience).

Also, you need to clarify with your lawyer about the extent of the PI exemption. In many states, the exemption only applies to certain aspects of the settlement, and not others and courts tend to try to limit this exemption. Colorado's exemption seems fairly broad, but you should double check.

[lrprn]

I finally got my personal injury suit settled.

So glad this is finally behind you, anon! Although the award wasn't as much as you hoped, hopefully there will be enough left for you to file. You've had to wait a long time - at least the waiting is over!

A question - did your insurance company pay on your medical bills already? Or have they held off paying until the settlement came through? Did you sign a subrogation agreement?

[SinkingFast]

Congrats, Anon!!

Hopefully the details won't eat up all of your settlement money and you can take care of some things you need.