Episode 32: The Legal Domino Effect of a Car Crash

James Rattling Leafs.

First of all, let me say that i'm going to use myself as an example here and that other attorneys i'm going to use what my trip ups were when I first started, I think that's.

James Rattling Leafs.

You remember your trip ups versus your victories, I think, Nelson memory, but I think my biggest problem when I first started in that area was setting expectations.

I was in a larger firm when I started this and the average client came in expecting to become a millionaire from a personal injury case.

And my biggest takeaway from that early experience was you've got to set the expectations at a reasonable level and the other.

So that's the first main thing that I thought that I think of when I remember those days.

Managing and handling bills and expectations during the term of the case is another kind of an area that I feel really I didn't really zone in on in my very beginning.

Typically, and especially if the injuries were such that the person was not able to work.

How do they manage that? That's part of the managing expectations, figuring out what the support's gonna be.

That was another area that I frankly overlooked in the very beginning.

And I had some consequences to that.

People got upset, et cetera, et cetera, as I'm sure you know very well dealing in this area yourself.

So you've gotta do that.

And then the other thing that I think that comes to mind is managing Medicare and Medicaid liens, how that would affect a settlement.

where there can be a lien filed against the estate for medical bills that were maybe paid by governmental assistance.

That's something that was kind of hard for me to weave into my processing of any of the case files I did early.

I learned early, though, that those tripping areas need to be avoided or put up front when your initial consultation with the client.

I think that's probably the main area that I can think of where I had some issues in the beginning.

Your website mentions that you've worked in the personal injury space several years before becoming an attorney.

And you may have already pointed this out or mentioned this with the answer to the previous question.

What do those early years teach you about how claims actually move behind the scenes?

Yeah, my first initial response to that is slowly, depending on the case.

If it was a very hard case where there was substantial injuries, where actual broken bones or horrific scarring, et cetera, et cetera, normally there wasn't much negotiating with the adjuster from the insurance company.

Here's the limit.