Accidents happen and claims are lodged on insurance companies for compensation, but determining the worth of accident injuries is a vital aspect of any personal injury claim

Accidents happen and claims are lodged on insurance companies for compensation, but determining the worth of accident injuries is a vital aspect of any personal injury claim. This part of the accident injury is quite difficult to assess because the amount will vary in relation to the particular circumstances of the accident and demands made by the claimant.

It is important to know, what the insurance company must compensate. To assess the worth of a personal injury claim, we have to know the types of damages for which compensation is usually given. The following important parameters are taken into account to determine the liability of the insurance company.

- Expenses related to medical care and incidental costs
- Loss of income due to inability to work during treatment of injuries
- Physical disability/disfigurement being permanent in nature
- Missed family and social life due to hospitalization
- Denial of education and training due to injury
- Strains in family relationships due to depression, anxiety, inability to take care and interference with sexual relations
- Emotional stress and embarrassment in social life due to disability and disfigurement
- Damage to property

Determining compensation for the money spent and money lost is easy, but there is no procedure to figure out the value of pain, suffering, missed experiences and lost opportunities. The insurance companies have a damages formula by which they measure such losses in terms of money.

In a personal injury claim the insurance adjuster adds up the total medical expenses, referred to as "medical special damages" or "specials", incurred for the injury. Considering the "specials" amount as the base figure the adjuster determines how much to pay for the pain, suffering and emotional stress undergone by the victim. These losses are known as the "general" damages.

For relatively minor injuries the adjuster multiplies the amount of special damages by 1.5 or 2. But for critical injuries leading to serious and long lasting pain and suffering, the specials amount is multiplied by up to 5. In certain extreme cases the multiplier may be 10. Then the adjuster adds the income lost due to the inability to work. This is the usual formula adopted by insurance companies to arrive at a compensation figure, but this is not the final compensation. This is the figure from which negotiations can begin.

Another factor that is important in determining the amount of compensation is the fault of each person involved in an accident. This affects the amount the insurance company is likely to pay. We can fix the range of how much the injuries may be worth with the help of the damages formula, but the actual value of the compensation can be decided only after the question of fault is figured. This will ultimately be the actual compensation of the personal injury claim.

Though there is no yardstick to determine fault for an accident but in most cases the claimant and the insurance adjuster will have a fair idea whether the insured person was entirely at fault or partly responsible. A rough percentage of comparative fault is arrived at, and this amount is deducted from the figure arrived at by the damages formula to conclude the final figure of the personal injury claim.