How & Why
HOW?
When an insurance company is obligated to provide you with coverage under an insurance policy, whether it is a homeowners, accident, errors & omissions, liability, commercial, or other insurance polciy and is further obligated to provide a defense laywer and pay all or any liability on your behalf, they often reserve certain rights and mail a "reservation of rights" letter. What this means is that later on during the lawsuit, the insurer may change (reserving its right to change its position) its mind and simply walk away from defending you altogether or may defend you but is unwilling to pay all of a potential settlement or judgment against you because they are saying not all of the accusations in the lawsuit are covered. However, they rarely make this clear when speaking with you and the lawyer hired to defend you downplays this if they speak of it at all. But be aware that you may be exposed to money damages and required to pay thousands of dollars or have a judgment against you and you not even realize what is happening. If the insurer does reserve rights to "walk away" later, or "not cover" all of the claims, you have the right to hire the lawyer of your choice to defend you and they have to pay the attorney's fees.
WHY?
Why should you get a lawyer of your choice. Because of potential if not real conflicts of interests. Some lawyers are actually employed fulltime by the insurance company although this may not be clear to you. Most nearly all the rest work closely with the ajusters and insurance companies and strive to keep them happy so as to keep the business. They are essentially "slaves" to the insurance companies. Therefore, they will be pressured, if not openly, situationally, to do what is in the insurance companies interest and not yours. For example, keeping you informed and talking straight with you as they do their employer the insurance company. Often times a situation arises which is in the insurance compnaies best interest, say settle the lawsuit, but not yours because it may affect you personally or professionally. Your rights may be overlooked or downplayed regarding the obligations of the insurance company under the policy. And you may not be told all avenues available to you in a given situation because the lawyer and adjuster have already decided what is best for the insurer. It happens all the time.
At the Cary Schulman Law Firm, we want to educate Texas citizens and companies as to their RIGHT TO CHOOSE the lawyer of their choice and expose the conflicts of interest that exists when the insurance company pushes a "bought and paid for lawyer" without telling them of their right to hire a lawyer of their selection.
At the Cary Schulman Law Firm, we provide just and fair representation and have loyalties only to the person hiring us, not the insurance company. We bill the insurance company as required and in this situation never seek payment from our clients.* We have no relationships or agreements or contracts with insurance companies and insurance companies do not seek us out to represent them or their insureds as they do not "own" or "control" us.
Learn about and excercise your rights today and Contact Us for a free consultation and a free review and explanation of you insurance policy.
*in some instances, there may be a deductible in your insurance that must be satisfied before the insurance company will pay the legal bills. If this is the case, we will liberally work with you on this deductible.