December 31, 2007Health Insurance, Keeping Your Family Safe, LawsuitsNo CommentsMost folks don’t have a clue that if you drive drunk and are injured, your health insurance carrier may have no obligation to cover your medical bills for the injuries you have suffered!
As an accident lawyer who has represented many, many victims of drunk drivers I don’t have any sympathy for drunk drivers who injure, maim and kill my innocent clients, I nonetheless feel bad for the families of the drunk driver who may face staggering medical bills that are not covered by any insurance coverage. Chalk this up as one more, of the MANY, good reasons why no one should EVER Drink and Drive. Save a life– call a cab! Read the rest…
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December 28, 2007Keeping Your Family Safe, LawsuitsNo CommentsThis should go without saying but it is DUMB, DUMB, DUMB to text message while driving. With three teens in the house (two of whom are driving), I know first-hand just how addictive text messaging is to anyone under 30 years old but the story below (courtesy of Engadget) illustrates just how deadly this can be…..
According to a report from the Boston Globe, a man claims that he was typing a text message into his cellphone when he lost control of his SUV and fatally struck a 13-year-old boy on a bicycle. In a stark and sad reminder of the cause for recent laws put into effect governing texting / phoning while driving, it appears the man was so distracted that he didn’t even realize what had happened until later that night. Ironically, the friend of the boy who had been walking with him attempted to call 911 on his phone, but was unable to get through. The driver is being charged with motor vehicle homicide, leaving the scene of an accident resulting in death, and driving without a license. A tragic story — and unfortunately not the first we’ve seen — but hopefully a cautionary tale for anyone who regularly juggles driving and texting. Don’t.
Please drive carefully….
Thanks for reading,
Jim
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December 28, 2007Choosing a Lawyer, Law Technology4 CommentsKevin O’Keefe at Lexblog posted today about a relatively new website, www.avvo.com, that assigns numerical ratings to lawyers.
Here is how Avvo describes what it does:
Avvo is a website that rates and profiles every lawyer, so you can choose the right lawyer…
The Avvo Rating: Based on information we have collected about a lawyer, the Avvo Rating is our effort to evaluate a lawyer’s background, based on the information we know about the lawyer, using a mathematical model that considers the information shown in a lawyer’s profile - information that, in our opinion, is relevant to assessing a lawyer’s qualifications
Many law bloggers have been critical of the formulas used to calculate the Avvo rating and Kevin takes these bloggers to task in his post: Avvo Bashing Foolishness. Kevin says:
What’s the danger in giving people more information in their attempt to choose a lawyer in a world that’s been dominated by lawyer yellow page ads, sleazy TV advertising, and self-aggrandizing lawyer websites? If people want to use Avvo’s lawyer directory which includes third party commentary on a lawyers services and ratings, they’ll use it. If people do not believe Avvo is worthwhile, they’ll choose not to use it.
I agree with Kevin and here’s the Comment I posted to his post:
I agree with Kevin. Like it or not, Avvo is here to stay and compared to Martindale-Hubbell I think it is a dramatic improvement (and I say that despite the fact that my firm is rated AV by MH).
MH charged outrageous fees for the same type of information that Avvo now provides for free.
I like the social aspects of the Avvo site featuring client testimonials and peer endorsements.
Who can really argue with the fact that our clients are in the best position of all to judge the quality of our work? Client satisfaction should be of paramount concern to every attorney and any of us who recognize that fact should readily embrace Avvo as a great place for our happy clients to sing our praises. I have yet to educate my clients regarding Avvo (although I intend to in my next blog post and in my newsletter) and I have yet to draw any client testimonials in Avvo but I nonetheless think it is a site that should be embraced by all attorneys with happy clients…. “It is futile to resist….” 
Jim
I would be very curious to hear how clients feel about Avvo so please post a comment to this post with your input.
Thanks for reading,
Jim
Jim Reed, NY Accident Lawyer
PS BTW, here’s a link to my Avvo rating. I am proud of rating an 8.2 but I have always aspired to be a perfect 10. My wife tells me “fat chance”!
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December 26, 2007Keeping Your Family Safe, NY Auto Insurance1 CommentFor years and years you have faithfully paid your insurance premiums. Your driving record is unblemished– no accidents, no tickets. All is well….. Then, through no fault of your own, another driver crashes into your car causing a huge amount of damage to your car. Thankfully, you are not injured.
Seems like a simple situation where the other driver’s insurance company should take care of your property damage claim with no problems at all, right? Well think again…..
Read the rest…
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December 22, 2007LawsuitsNo CommentsFor those of us working as New York injury lawyers, we are used to reading media accounts that are critical of lawsuits on behalf of injured New Yorkers. Most of the time, we just quietly accept these negative articles as we know that our opponents– large corporations, insurance companies– are spending millions of dollars waging a media war against injury lawyers.
But now and then, someone takes the time to provide a thoughtful response to these attacks. Below is a response by Michael Palmer, a lawyer but NOT a trial lawyer, that I just loved:
Read the rest…
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December 22, 2007Humor2 CommentsHave you ever heard the expression that “it’s better to laugh than cry”? Those of us who live in Upstate New York just KNOW that this expression was coined by a native Upstate New Yorker because Upstate New York is one of the few places in the world where you can experience all four seasons- Winter, Spring, Summer and Fall- in a single day. As we enter the hectic holiday season and as I look out the window at 6 inches of snow on the ground (with rain in the weather forecast), I thought a little Upstate humor might be good for all of us! Keep reading for comedian Jeff Foxworthy’s hilarious poke at Upstate New Yorkers!
If you consider it a sport to gather your food by drilling through 36 inches of ice and sitting there all day hoping that the food will swim by, you might live in Upstate New York…..
Read the rest…
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December 21, 2007NY Auto Insurance1 CommentThere was recently a raging debate on the No-Fault Paradise blog about the high-cost of NF “fraud” — that is the allegedly high cost of fraudulent NF claims. One writer, citing loss statistics for carriers from eight years before, suggested that the insurance industry was suffering horribly because of fraudulent claims. But this response from D. Barshay was dynamite:
How can you, with a straight face, quote fraud statistics from eight years ago? Your [claim that insurance carriers are being] “driven out of business” comment is laughable. In 2005, the year of Hurricane Katrina, insurers that also provide auto insurance made a record $48.8-billion profit, 18.7% increase over 2004. The industry raised its surplus by more than 7% to nearly $427 billion. The ratio of claims and expenses to premiums was among the lowest in 30 years. In 2006, the profits were $59.9-billion and the surplus was $600 billion. Certainly, New York is much harder for insurers because of all the fraud, right? Wrong. Auto insurers reported $10.5 billion in earned premiums in New York in 2005, a jump of nearly 29 percent from $8.2 billion in 2000. Meanwhile, during the same period, incurred losses plummeted by more than 20 percent, from $6.4 billion to $5.1 billion. From 2000 to 2005, the loss ratio (the amount of each insurance premium dollar that goes to pay claims) in New York fell from 78.3 percent to 48.4 percent of premiums, according to the National Association of Insurance Commissioners (NAIC). This means that in 2005 only 48.4 cents of each premium dollar was paid to policyholders, a nearly 30 percentage point drop from 2000. The 2005 New York loss ratio was the lowest in the nation and was 11.8 percentage points below the nationwide loss ratio of 60.2 percent.
“For too long, auto insurance companies have been price-gouging New Yorkers,” Thompson said. “Rising premiums are becoming cost prohibitive and squeezing New Yorkers even more as they struggle to pay their rent, food, gas and other necessities. A reduction in premiums is the right direction so that drivers can afford to stay on the road.” William C. Thompson, Jr. New York City Comptroller.
D. Barshay
I don’t know D. Barshay but I tip my hat to him for citing the cold, hard fact that NY auto insurance carriers are making billions of dollars annually in profits while paying their industry lobbyists and marketing firms millions of dollars to continue the media campaign that they are in “crisis”. Man, could I use a crisis like that!!
Thanks for reading, Jim Reed
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December 18, 2007Attorney Ethics, NY Courts, NY Laws and CasesNo CommentsMany people feel that attorneys behaving badly is “par for the course” but we are fortunate to live in Upstate New York where the vast majority of the attorneys in the legal community are hard-working, reasonable and ethical. That’s not to say there aren’t some bad apples that make a bad name for everyone, but thankfully those attorneys are the exception rather than the rule. Downstate New York is a different story and most of the reported decisions regarding attorney misconduct come from Downstate (for us Upstate New York folks, “downstate” is anywhere South of the Roscoe Diner! :-) A recent downstate case (New York County Supreme Court illustrates my point….. Read the rest…
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December 18, 2007Lawsuits, NY Courts1 CommentDo you have a dispute with a local merchant, a neighbor, someone who did you wrong? If so, you might be able to easily handle the dispute on your own without having to hire a lawyer! Below are the nuts and bolts for handling a Small Claims Court matter in New York. Since my office is in Elmira, I will use the Small Claims Court information in Elmira as my example but I will also provide information for other courts throughout the State of New York.
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December 17, 2007NY Workers CompensationNo CommentsFor years, politicians have blamed New York’s expensive, complicated Workers’ Compensation system for the flight of businesses and workers from our state, and their inability to attract new businesses and jobs. After more than a decade of complaining, our state is finally doing something to fix the problem. Just recently the New York State Assembly and Senate voted unanimously to approve a bill that, when signed by the governor, will result in sweeping changes to New York’s workers’ compensation system. Under current estimates, the bill will result in an immediate reduction in worker’s compensation premiums paid by employers of 10-15%.
Employers aren’t the only ones who will benefit from this bill, however. The maximum weekly benefit for injured employees will rise from $400.00 (unchanged in the last 15 years) to $500.00 in year 1, $550.00 in year 2, $600.00 in year 3, and to two-thirds of New York’s average weekly wage every year thereafter. That average weekly wage was last reported at $998.00 in 2005. The minimum weekly benefit would rise from $40.00 to $100.00. The bill also provides for more assistance to help injured workers get back to work, and speeds up court cases to get injured workers their benefits faster. The bill is also designed to prevent the current practice by insurance carriers of denying approval for routine medical procedures that often results in longer periods of disability for the injured employees. Read the rest…
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