Your actions in the hours and days following a traffic accident can alter the course of your legal claims. The right moves can clear the way for a fair resolution of any disputes between you and the at-fault driver.

However, even a minor slip-up may raise issues that the other driver’s insurance company can use to delay or reduce a settlement or even deny your claim.

A common tactic used by insurance companies is to talk to you before you have spoken to a lawyer. The insurer may inform you that this conversation is necessary to investigate your claim.

Even if this is the case, you should strongly consider avoiding a conversation with the insurer. Instead, consider consulting a personal injury attorney to understand your right to seek compensation for any injury-related losses.

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What Is a Recorded Statement?

After a crash in fault-based states like Texas, Arkansas, Oklahoma, Illinois, and many others, a crash victim files a claim with the at-fault driver’s insurance company. The claim describes what occurred and provides supporting documentation, such as the accident report and any medical records.

The claim is assigned to an adjuster for investigation. Specifically, the adjuster determines whether the claim falls within the at-fault driver’s auto policy. To make this determination, the adjuster must find that the insured driver acted negligently in causing the crash.

As part of the investigation, the adjuster will ask you for a recorded statement. This statement is a telephone conversation between you and the adjuster. The adjuster asks you questions about the accident and records your answers.

Although it might seem logical that the other driver’s insurer needs to speak to you before paying your claim, the recorded statement can be a trap. Adjusters can often investigate claims based on the crash report and an interview with their customer.

Talking to you is often unnecessary. In many cases, a recorded statement will do more harm than good to your injury claim.

Dangers Posed by a Recorded Statement

Claim adjusters work for insurance companies. Even when an insurer outsources to independent adjusters, the company still pays the adjusters’ fees. Adjusters protect insurers from paying claims that fall outside the policies. In other words, an adjuster’s goal is to pay only those claims where the insured driver is clearly liable.

As a result, adjusters actively look for reasons to deny claims. That’s why an adjuster might use a recorded statement to ask you how fast you were driving, whether you were facing the sun, and other incriminating statements.

Some go a step further, using your words to create nonexistent problems. An adjuster might take statements out of context or use leading questions to get you to agree with something that did not happen.

Adjusters can deny claims for many reasons and might use your recorded statement against you in the following ways:

  • Make it appear as though you exaggerated your injuries
  • Question whether you know how the crash happened
  • Shift the blame for the crash to you

Talking to the other driver’s insurer without a lawyer could be compared to talking to the police without legal representation. Like police officers, adjusters are trained to get you to make admissions or make statements that sound like admissions.

How a Lawyer Can Help You Communicate with the Insurer

You can protect yourself from an insurance company’s tactics by informing the claims adjuster that you need to speak to a lawyer about whether to give a recorded statement. Your lawyer becomes the point of contact with the insurance company. Specifically, once you hire a lawyer, the adjuster is supposed to direct any requests to him or her, not you.

Your lawyer can answer any questions that the adjuster asks, protecting you from possible misstatements. The attorney can also inform the insurer that you will not give a statement at all. This means the company must process your claim using the evidence it already has, such as your claim documents and the accident report.

There are occasions where your statement is necessary, however. For example, suppose you were unable to talk to the police officer who investigated your crash because you were unconscious or incapacitated at the crash scene. You might want to tell your side of the story to the other driver’s insurer.

The lawyer can represent you while you give the statement, advising you as you answer the adjuster’s questions.

Handling Your Injury Claim

Car accident claims are not easy. The insurer can take your words out of context or pounce on a minor misstatement to make getting compensation even more difficult. A personal injury lawyer can speak to insurers on your behalf to safeguard your interests.