Atlanta Injury Lawyers Can Protect Your Recovery from Insurance Companies Seeking Reimbursement for Medical Payments made to Your Medical Providers.
As an Atlanta injury lawyer, I am seeing more and more cases where my clients' automobile insurance companies are seeking reimbursement for medical payments coverage they have paid as a result of a collision caused by an at fault party. This type of reimbursement has not been seen in Georgia since 1997 when the Georgia General assembly passed O.C.G.A. § 33-24-56.1. The passage of the statute all but ended an insurance company's ability to obtain reimbursement for medical payments made in automobile accident cases. Nothing has really changed with the statute; however, it looks like hard economic times have caused insurance companies began to push to recover some of the monies they have paid under medical payments coverage as allowed by their policies.
O.C.G.A. § 33-24-56.1 sets out several requirements that insurance company must meet before they can recover reimbursement for benefits paid under the medical payment provisions of their policies. First, the statute limits the insurance company's right of reimbursement for benefits paid to the amount allocated to those categories of damages in the settlement documents or judgment. A good accident injury lawyer will ensure such an allocation is not made; thereby disallowing the insurance company's right to seek reimbursement.
Next, even assuming the requirement of allocating the categories of damages is met, the statute also provides that there can be no reimbursement unless the claimant is fully compensated for all economic and non-economic damages. Again, a good injury lawyer will ensure all the proper documentation indicates his or her client has not been fully and completely compensated for all economic and non-economic damages most likely frustrating an insurance company's attempt at reimbursement.
Even if an insurance company can successfully jump through the allocation and full compensation hoops, the amount of reimbursement must be reduced by the pro rata amount of the claimant's attorney's fees and expenses of litigation incurred in bringing the claim against the at fault driver. Accordingly, any possible recovery from the claimant for med pay benefits would be reduced by a portion of the claimant's attorney's fees and expenses.
Finally, there are strict notice requirements the insurance company must meet to successfully seek reimbursement. These requirements are rarely met, and a good accident injury lawyer will know whether they are met or not.
Please contact an Atlanta injury lawyer in our office if you would like to discuss these or any other issues that might affect your automobile injury claim.
