California Personal Injury Law FAQs

What are a person’s rights under the Fair Claims Settlement Practices Regulations?
Generally, insurance companies are required to do the following:

• Tell you about all benefits, coverage, time limits or other relevant provisions of your insurance policy.
• Acknowledge claim, start investigation, provide forms and instructions, and provide reasonable assistance immediately but in no event later than 15 days after receiving notice of your claim.
• Reply to communications received from you immediately but in no event later than 15 days.
• Accept or deny your claim immediately but in no event later than 40 days after receiving proof of claim. (Proof of claim is documentation in your possession which provides any evidence of the claim and supports the magnitude or the amount of the loss such as estimates of repair, medical bills, police report, et cetera.)
• Offer a fair settlement.
• Once the claim has been accepted, the insurer must pay the claim immediately, but in no event later than 30 days from the date settlement was reached.

The above represents a summary of some of the Fair Claims Settlement Practices Regulations effective 5/10/97. You may view a complete copy of the Regulations by visiting the California Department of Insurance website located at www.insurance.ca.gov.

What is negligence?
Negligence happens when a person’s conduct imposes an unreasonable risk of harm on another and results in injury to the latter. Whether or not the negligent person actually meant for the harm to occur does not matter.

What is an “unreasonable” risk?
An act is considered to have an unreasonable risk of harm when a reasonable person would recognize the act as being potentially harmful to another, and that risk outweighs the utility of the act or of the way in which the act is done.

What are the components of a negligence claim?

• Duty: In order to be found negligent, the “negligent” person must have a legal duty requiring the person to conduct himself according to a certain standard in order to avoid the unreasonable risk harm to others.
• Failure to conform: A failure by the negligent person to meet whatever standard is required by law. (This element can sometimes be thought of as "carelessness.")
• Causation: There must be a close enough proximity, or link, between the defendant’s breach of duty (negligent act) and the subsequent injury suffered.
• Actual damage: Actual damage suffered by the person. Damages cannot be recovered without injury.

What is a “reasonable person”?
The reasonableness of the negligent person’s conduct will be viewed under an objective standard: Would a reasonable person in the negligent person’s position, act as the negligent person did? The negligent person’s intent to behave carefully or thinking that he or she behaved carefully does not remove liability.

Call 877-742-5290 to have your case reviewed by a California personal injury lawyer today.