What you should know about your car insurance if you are in an Accident: You probably don't have enough.

Optional bodily injury coverage insures people you injure, including your passengers. You should have high enough limits to protect yourself any anyone injured in an accident. Most drivers in Massachusetts select the minimum mandatory bodily injury coverage of $20,000 per person, $40,000 per accident. This is not enough coverage to fully compensate you if you are seriously injured in an automobile accident. The maximum coverage $250,000 per person, $500,000 per accident is rarely purchased, although also barely adequate in the event of serious injury.

If you own your own home you can purchase an umbrella or excess policy for a couple of hundred dollars which will provide 1 or 2 million dollars in bodily injury coverage IF you carry underlying optional bodily injury primary limits of $100,000.00 or $250,000.00.

Insurance also protects your assets in the event of a serious injury. If a person is seriously injured and the only available coverage is $20,000 they may sue to collect the remainder of medical bills, pain and suffering and long term care. A judgment against you may be enforced for twenty years and can be renewed after that. Additionally such a judgment may not be dischargeable in bankruptcy.

You can also buy coverage to protect yourself and passengers if you or they are injured by a driver who has no insurance or has too little insurance. This is called uninsured or underinsured (UM) coverage. This is the only coverage you can buy to cover your non-economic losses if you are seriously injured in a motor vehicle accident. It will also pay medical bills and lost earning capacity. There are an estimated 300,000 uninsured drivers in Massachusetts and many more in our border states of New Hampshire and Rhode Island. Again most drivers in Massachusetts have the minimum mandatory bodily injury coverage of $20,000.00 per person, $40,000.00 per accident-insufficient coverage if you are seriously injured in an automobile accident. If you are a victim of someone else's negligence make sure you have enough insurance coverage of your own to protect yourself. Most people do not have enough coverage to protect themselves in the event the person who hits them has no insurance or too little insurance.

Most people find out they have too little insurance only after they have an accident and hire a lawyer. Protect yourself before you need to use the coverage.

Lawyerviews.com guide to Massachusetts Personal Injury Law.

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