Dear Adjuster,
I was in the parking lot at the grocery store and another car backed into me. I filed a claim with my own insurance company and they paid less my $1000 dollar deductible. Now they are telling me that I will only get half of that back. What gives?
Confused in Islamorada
Dear Confused,
Insurance coverages, policies and laws can be very confusing. Many states, including Florida, have a pure comparative negligence law. This means that a person can pursue another party involved in the loss for the percentage for which they are at fault. For example, if a person is 99% at fault, they can still seek the 1% for which they are not at fault. In a parking lot accident, it is very common to have shared liability. Two vehicles backing into one another with no witness may result in a 50/50 settlement. This may be an agreement between the two carriers, or it may have been settled via Inter-Company arbitration if the carriers were members.
