If you own a car in North Carolina, you should understand automobile insurance coverages.
The North Carolina Department of Insurance is an excellent source of information on automobile insurance. On the DOI website, you can find information about various types of insurance.
Liability coverage will pay for bodily injury and property damage for which any covered individual becomes legally responsible. The Personal Automobile Policy will cover you or any family member while using any automobile or trailer, and any person using your covered automobile with permission. The policy will pay up to the limits listed in your policy. Under this coverage you will have separate limits of liability per person injured and limits of liability per accident. This is called split limits. For example, you may have limits of 100/300/50. This would mean that your policy would pay up to a maximum of $100,000 to any one person injured by a covered driver or up to $300,000 for all injured parties combined, as a result of a single accident. Also, this coverage has a single limit of liability for all property damage resulting from any one accident. Using the above example of 100/300/50 limits, you will have a limit of $50,000 Property Damage Liability for each accident.
The DOI website also provides information on Uninsured and Underinsured Motorists:
Uninsured Motorists (UM) Coverage will provide protection when an uninsured driver, who is at fault, injures you or another covered individual. It also provides property damage coverage.
Underinsured Motorists (UIM) Coverage will provide protection when an underinsured driver, who is at fault, causes injury to a covered individual. An underinsured driver is one whose limits of liability are less than your UIM limits, and not enough to cover the losses of the people the underinsured driver injures in an at-fault accident.
The UIM coverage will pay a maximum of the difference between the other driver’s Liability limits and your UIM limits.
In addition, the DOI website has a frequently asked questions webpage that addresses many questions that people often have related to automobile insurance issues. For example:
What does my policy require me to do after an accident?
Notify the insurance company of how, when and where the accident or loss happened. Include the names and addresses of anyone who is injured and any witnesses. Cooperate with the investigation. Obtain or authorize the insurance company to obtain appropriate documents, medical information and other pertinent records.
Contact the Ralph Bryant Law Firm if you have been injured in an accident. Attorney Bryant has over thirty years of experience handling automobile accident and the personal injury claims.
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