What is a mediation?

In the context of an auto accident case, you and the defendant as well as your two respective lawyers are going to be put into two different rooms and there’s going to be a person called the mediator who goes back and forth between the two rooms and attempt to resolve whatever matters you may have that are currently keeping you from being able to settle the case, whether that’s a liability issue or it’s a value issue or something else that goes beyond the scope of what we’re talking about.

The idea behind non-binding is that it’s essentially a discussion where you can sit down. You can haggle and you can talk over all the issues and in the event that you are unable to resolve your issues at the end of the process, essentially you can walk away from the table but you walk away from the table with more information than you had before. You have a clearer sense of what the central issues are that you need to be working on as you move forward.

The second thing is the actual process in which a mediation takes place because it’s kind of an interesting process.

Typically what you’re going to see is that the plaintiff is placed in one room in a completely different part of the building and the defendant is placed with their respective attorneys in another room.

The mediator will go back and forth between the plaintiff and the defendant essentially communicating what the most recent offer is or what the most recent variation on the terms are.

In doing so, what you’re able to do is take a lot of emotion out of the process of negotiation and that can be a real hindrance when you’re trying to get something resolved because everybody feels like they’re in the right. Everybody wants what they want and they bring their emotions to the table. But when you take in and you physically separate the two parties, you’re able to take a lot of that emotion and put it aside and really bring it to essentially what the issues are that you’re trying to resolve.

In doing so, a lot of times you’re able to resolve things that people really – coming into the process, really did not think that they were going to be able to resolve. In that respect, mediation is a very important tool in today’s judicial system, which brings me to my third point, that the judicial system favors mediation and in fact in most counties in the State of South Carolina, mediation is going to be required both in the context of family court issues, personal injury issues and specifically medical malpractice issues.

It is required. It’s something that you actually have to go to and go through before you can actually get in front of a judge and the reason why they do that is because from an administrative point of view, the

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courts are overwhelmed with the number of suits that people were bringing against one another.

This is a way of reducing that number from an administrative perspective. More to the point, it’s a way of keeping the cases that actually should be in court. They will make it there eventually. If there really are issues that need to be litigated, they will be. But this kind of weeds out all the ones that don’t necessarily need to be in court but people were pressing for litigation because their emotions were driving their decision-making.

If you have any questions please contact The Hartman Law Firm at 843-300-7600 today!

What Should You Do if You Were Unhappy with the Repairs that the Defendant’s Insurance Company Made to Your Vehicle Following Your Auto Accident?

There are several things that you should be aware of. First and foremost, do not sign the final release that they put in front of you. What you need to do is more than likely make a telephone call and follow up with the letter, stating that you are unhappy with the overall repairs that have been made to your vehicle and that you want to keep it open as far as the claim is concerned and you want to have your vehicle looked at by an independent shop of your own choosing.

At this point, you have gotten your car and it has already been looked at by the insurance company’s repair shop and if you find yourself unhappy with the overall repair, what you’re going to need is to take your car to a trusted repair shop, typically someone that you’ve worked with before and have an independent estimate done by that particular repair shop.

What you want to put them on notice of is to look for aftermarket parts which are used parts pulled off of vehicles from salvage yards and if you can establish that those have been used or that the repairs were substandard or more importantly maybe there were some undiscovered repairs that were not taken care of, there was some hidden damage that wasn’t there that’s discovered by the second mechanic, you need to bring that to the attention of the insurance company of the defendant and say, “Look, you guys missed this particular part and these parts are unacceptable. I want you to go back and I want you to replace it with new parts and this hidden damage needs to be repaired as well.”

So you’re going to have to get that new estimate. You’re going to have to provide it to them and you’re going to say these numbers don’t jive and what are we going to do about it.

It’s just going to be a matter of negotiation between you and the insurance company in order to get the kind of result that you want with regard with the kind of money you need to repair your vehicle.

If you need help with a car accident. Please contact The Hartman Law Firm at 843-300-7600 today.

What you should do immediately following your accident with your totaled car?

When your car is totaled immediately following an accident and by totaled, I mean you’ve been involved in a very substantial wreck and the car is no longer drivable. A tow truck obviously is going to need to come and take it from the scene of the secondary road or the interstate and it is going to take it to the storage facility where the tow truck works out of.

Typically you’re going to find that the charge for that is anywhere between $150 to $250 which is something you can certainly reimburse by the defendant’s insurance company for.

However what the hidden charge is that you’re unaware of is every day that your car is actually there and it’s not drivable and it’s where – at the tow yard essentially, it’s going to be charged anywhere between 30 to 50 bucks for every day that it’s sitting there.

Under South Carolina law, you have an obligation to mitigate your damages. By mitigate, I mean lessen your damages. In other words, you’ve got an obligation to make it so that the car doesn’t sit there for very long.

Typically you’re going to find the car is going to sit there when the defendant’s insurance company is having a hard time coming to the conclusion of who’s at fault for the wreck and accepting liability because it’s only when they accept liability that they will actually go get the car from the tow yard and take it to a salvage yard.

The significance of that is once it’s taken to the salvage yard, you’re no longer going to be charged for the storage fees. So you’ve got two choices immediately following an accident.

You can wait and just kind of take your chances and hope that the defendant’s insurance company picks up the tab for all the storage fees or if you have the means, my suggestion would be for you to go and get your vehicle and have it towed from the tow yard to the salvage yard on your own dime and obviously you can submit that bill to the defendant’s insurance company for payment later on. But it will save you money in the long run because you’re not going to be charged $30 a day.

The only other option I can think of is if you have the means either yourself or through a friend and you’re able to tow the car yourselves, you can actually have the car and bring it to your house and just put it in your yard and wait for the insurance company to come get it and once they accept liability and the claim moves forward, they will come and they will tow the vehicle from your car and take it to the salvage yard at that time.

If you have questions or you’ve been involved in an auto accident. Please pick up the telephone and call The Hartman Law Firm at 843-300-7600.

The Issue of Diminution of Value in the State of South Carolina.

The issue of diminution of value to put it in the parlance of our times or in layman’s terms is essentially when your car loses value because you’ve been in an auto accident.

Now typically you’re going to see this in the context of newer vehicles. Maybe you’ve got your model make of 2011, 2012. When you bought it, it was a $30,000 or $35,000 car.

Now granted at this point, some of the money has come off but the blue book value of that car is still going to be pretty high, definitely in the 20s assuming that you paid $31,000 for it.

So the significant thing is, is were you to turn around and try to sell that car, you could ostensibly ask for $20,000, $25,000 and probably get it from a private seller.

If you’re involved in an auto accident, unfortunately, the value of your car is going to automatically drop as soon as it has been involved in a wreck and that is what diminution of value is, when your value is diminished because you’ve been in an auto accident.

Unfortunately, it doesn’t sound in South Carolina law and what I mean by that is the South Carolina Supreme Court has already written law to say that that’s not something that you can pursue in the State of South Carolina as a value in the context of your auto accident.

What I would recommend in the event that you do decide to push forward with the defendant’s insurance company, because it can be done usually with the aid of a lawyer, what you’re going to need to do is you’re going to go back to the dealership that you bought the car at and you’re going to say, “I need an estimate of what this vehicle is worth the day that it was wrecked 10 minutes beforehand. I need to know what the repairs were, an estimate on what the repairs were and more importantly I need to know what the value of the car is right now.”

So just to make things simple, let’s say your car was worth $25,000 before the wreck. They say that there has been $10,000 worth of repair and it runs now and it’s ready to be back on the road but that $10,000 is coming off the top and now your car is only worth 15 grand. That diminution of value, that really rubs people the wrong way after they’ve been in an auto accident and it’s not their fault.

The easiest thing that you can do is typically with the assistance of a lawyer, you’re really going to have to get after the defendant’s insurance company and what I found is that the squeaky wheel gets the grease. If you send enough letters, you make enough phone calls, and you talk to enough people in management, eventually they will give.

They may not necessarily give you all of the potential value that you lost but they certainly will give you something and as my grandmother has always said, “Half a loaf is better than none.”

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If you have been in an auto accident and you need assistance, contact the Hartman Law Firm at 843-300-7600.