When injured due to someone else’s carelessness, you may be eligible to sue for personal injury damages. Economic and non-economic damages are two different sorts of compensation that a victim might receive in a personal injury case.
Following your accident, it’s critical to contact an expert personal injury lawyer in Florida as soon as possible so that all records may be gathered and calculated correctly.
It’s essential to understand all the rules to win a personal injury case in Florida. Your injury lawyer will look at similar issues and strive for appropriate compensation for your damages for you to get the right amount.
Special Damages
If a person has suffered economic or “special” damages, such as medical bills, missed income, property losses, and out-of-pocket expenditures.
It is essential to keep all medical documents for emergency room visits, ambulance services, chiropractic visits, x-rays, rehab, and lab tests. This is so you can be reimbursed for your medical costs. The reimbursement starts from the date of the accident and can cover your current bills and future bills as well.
If you are injured and must miss work, you will be paid for the days you missed. This payment starts from the day of your injury and continues until the day you return to work. Your employer can give you a document stating how many days you missed work due to your injury.
If you get injured, you might have to pay for:
Medications
Physical medical aids
Parking fees
Rental car costs
If you had any property damage because of the accident, you might be able to get compensated for it. Keep all receipts of what you paid for because you will need to show these to the insurance company. This way, they can reimburse you fairly.
General Damages
Non-economic damages are damages that can’t be measured. This includes loss of enjoyment, pain and suffering, emotional distress, and loss of consortium. These damages don’t require receipts and aren’t available in every case.
If you have an injury and the pain lasts for a long time, you may be able to get money from the person who caused the accident. You will need to show that you were affected emotionally by accident. This is done by acquiring written evidence from a mental health professional. This professional will say how you were affected emotionally.
If you used to do things before your injury that you can’t do now, this would be considered a loss of enjoyment of life. For example, if you had a severe spinal injury in a car accident and can’t move as much as you could before, then you’re missing out on the activities you enjoyed before the accident.
Lastly, if you have experienced injuries so severe that you lost out on the benefits of family relationships, you may be able to recover financial compensation. For example, if you had a debilitating injury and can no longer care for your children, this would constitute a loss of consortium.
Even though these things do not have a price tag to tell how much they are worth, these non-economic damages can negatively affect people who have been seriously injured.
Punitive Damages
If someone injures you, and the court finds that they were very careless in what they did, you may be awarded extra money called punitive damages. Punitive damages are in addition to the compensatory damages that you receive for being injured.
Comparative Negligence
Florida is a state that follows the ‘Comparative Negligence‘ rule. This means that even if you are partially responsible for an accident, you can still recover damages from the other party.
For example, if the court found you to be 20% responsible for the accident and awarded you $100,000 in damages, you would end up with an $80,000 settlement.
Damage Caps in Florida Injury Cases
Damage caps limit the amount of money someone can get for an injury. For some instances, this limit is usually lost, like the money someone can get for their pain and suffering.
The essential Florida damage cap pertains to punitive damages involving personal injuries, such as automobile accidents, slip and fall incidents, and product defect claim. In most injury situations, the state has a three-times limit on how much money can be levied (punitive damages) as punishment.
This law is found in Florida Statutes Annotated section 768.73. It is important to note that punitive damages are only available in a small percentage of injury cases. The law is meant to punish the wrongdoer for particularly dangerous or reprehensible behavior.
There are no other damage cap laws in Florida regarding personal injury cases. In June 2017, Florida Supreme Court ruled a state law limiting non-economic damages like pain and suffering in medical malpractice cases unconstitutional.
Safeguard Your Damages, Contact Jordan Law
There is a lot that could go wrong when you file a personal injury claim. Therefore, it is important to have a reputable personal injury attorney representing you. They’ll ensure that nothing goes wrong and that the insurance company is treating you fairly.
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