HOW LONG WILL IT TAKE TO SETTLE MY MN PERSONAL INJURY CASE?
How long does it take to settle a personal injury case? The answer depends on the specific facts of your case. As a general rule, our accident injury lawyers recommend you do not settle your case until all your injuries are definitely known. In other words, you should recover your health as much as you are going to before settlement. The reason for this is that you can only settle your case once; you cannot go back later and ask for additional compensation because your injury is worse than you thought. This is true for car accident cases, slip fall, dog bite and all the other injury cases we handle.
In many situations, the case will settle about 12 – 18 months after the accident. However, if the injury is severe or requires surgery, it will take longer for the case to settle. That is because it takes longer to reach the point where your body has recovered as much as it is going to. Generally, your personal injury attorney needs a final opinion from your doctor about the permanency of your injuries. In most cases, doctors won’t do this until at least a year after the injury or, if there was surgery, a year after the surgery. Another issue is sorting out the medical bills. Unfortunately, that can also take more than a year.
ADDITIONAL TIME WHEN INSURANCE COMPANY DISPUTES THE CLAIM
Settlement also depends on the other person’s insurance company. It takes longer in cases where the insurance company disputes who was at fault in the accident or the extent of your injury. For example, sometimes the insurance company claims that your injury was from a preexisting condition. In these types of cases, your personal injury lawyer may have to begin a lawsuit. The time for settlement of a case through the Minnesota courts will usually take an additional 12 – 20 months while the attorneys prepare the case and it gets on the court’s trial calendar.
The only way you will be fairly compensated is if you let your attorney collect, document and provide all available information to the insurance company. It is important to be patient and not overeager to settle. Although the amount of time it takes for the settlement can be frustrating, we recommend patience. If you are overanxious to get the case settled, you will not get as fair compensation.
Even though it takes a long time to resolve your case, it is important that you contact an attorney soon after your MN accident. You want a proper and complete investigation of the accident to be performed. Allowing the personal injury lawyer to gather information early on will better protect your rights in connection with your claims. In many personal injury cases, it is the information we gather in the first few weeks after the accident that is crucial, even if it is ultimately not actually used until more than a year later.