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You need a personal injury lawyer so you can fully understand what your rights are after you’ve been in an accident. A lot of people don’t know what the laws are relating to accidents, what sort of compensation they might be entitled to, what the fault rules might be around, say, a motor vehicle accident. An experienced personal injury lawyer can fill in all those blanks for you and give you the advice that you need.

There are two things I would look for: The first one is that it is an individual that you can have a personal relationship with and be comfortable in sharing some very often intimate details of your life with. The second thing is to ensure that they have a good understanding of the area of law. You need to leave feeling comfortable personally and professionally that the person is experienced, well-educated and knows what they’re doing in order to properly represent you in your claim.

If your injury gets worse, you will need to seek more medical information and treatment in order to rehabilitate those injuries. We will guide you and assist you with answering questions and support you in your efforts to rehabilitate those injuries. If you settle your claim too quickly and your injuries get worse, then you’ve missed an opportunity to get the compensation you deserve. So it’s very important that we understand your injuries and what the future entails for you before you settle your claim.

There are parameters for what we call pain and suffering awards that have been set by our courts. The compensation that a person will receive as a result of an injury sustained in an accident is very much dependent upon the range that has been set by the courts for those types of injuries. There are a number of heads of damages that we claim for. One is pain and suffering. Another involves an economic loss: a loss of past income as well as a diminishment in earning capacity, which is basically a loss of income in the future as a result of the accident. We can advise people what the proper and fair compensation is for them based upon the injuries they’ve sustained, and the economic loss that they have sustained or are likely to sustain in the future. That’s why it’s important that when people hire somebody who has a lot of experience and who they feel comfortable is going to make sure that they receive the compensation that they deserve.

If you’ve been injured in an accident, you should call a personal injury lawyer as soon as you are capable of doing so. It’s important to engage a legal counsel from the outset. There have been some regulatory changes to insurance law in Newfoundland and Labrador with notification requirements to insurance companies that the average person would not be aware of, but lawyers certainly are. So as soon as you’re able physically, mentally to contact a lawyer, you should pick up the phone and make that call.

If you’ve been dealing with the insurance company, don’t forget: part of their mandate is profit. The less they give out, the more profit they make. It’s a conflict of interest for them to be offering you an amount to settle. It’s not objective. Get advice from a personal injury lawyer who deals with this on a day-to-day basis. Someone who can review your medical history, the impact of the collision, the slip and fall or whatever injury you’ve suffered, and liaise with health care providers and determine what your exact prognosis is. We can then compare that with cases across the country that have been litigated and come up with a range that would be fair from your side, not the party who is at fault.

It will generally take about a year because the lawyers and the doctors would like to see how you respond to all the different activities that we do in our lifetimes over a 12-month period. Sometimes it takes longer — complications, other investigations, specialists, orthopedics, neurology may be involved.

Calling us initially, there’s no fee at all. We’ll assess your case and when we get a reasonable settlement at the end, we’ll take our fee from there and you’ll have your settlement.

If the car accident is your fault, there’s still some benefits you could be entitled to. These are known as accident benefits, section B. They’ll cover you for compensation for treatments such as chiropractic, physiotherapy, massage therapy, mileage to and from your appointments, regardless of who’s at fault for the accident. So certainly give us a call and we can explain to you what you’re entitled to. Also, even if you’re at fault and you have passengers in the vehicle, they may be entitled to make a claim, so they can also give us a call and we can explain what they’re entitled to.