Handel on the law part II

 I once again tuned into Handel on the Law for a little while over the weekend. It always seems to have great insurance questions that Handel answers in usually a half baked way. Clearly, he is great at giving marginal legal advise, the same also applies to his marginal insurance advice.  In order to give slightly less marginal advice I took the information from a few calls he had and added a bit more useful information.
The first call out of the gate was from a woman who just adopted a dog. I really respect people who adopt dogs, because inherently any dog that has been either returned to a shelter or abandoned by their owner has some issue. I remember when I was looking for my first dog I went to a shelter. I found this beautiful English Mastiff and I watched in amazement as he tore a comforter to shreds. He was just demolishing that thing and throwing the bits all about his enclosure. Uhm, one look at that dog and my head flashed to what my couch would look like once I brought that big fella home. It wouldn’t be pretty and I moved on to look at the next dog. Okay, so back to this lady’s insurance question. She adopted a dog and the dog went running out the front door after she brought him home. It then headed straight for the neighbors house and got into a fight with the dog from next door. The next door dog was chained up and it sounds like both dogs sustained injuries and the owner of the chained up dog also got injured trying to break up the fight.  Now, who is to blame? Well, it is pretty clear in this case, if you have your dog off leash and they are not under your control you are 100 percent liable. You could have the sweetest dog, and the chained up dog could be a monster. But, it is your responsibility to keep the dog under your control.  This lady then went on to say that she got a letter from the neighbor attorney stating they wanted money for damages. Handel kept repeating that she should turn it over to her homeowners association. I think he meant she should turn it over to her Homeowners Insurance. And, yes she should. The home insurance company would try to pay first out under medical coverage, if that wasn’t enough to cover the injuries then the liability portion would kick in. As long as her homeowners insurance policy offers animal liability protection and they don’t exclude the particular dog breed she has, then all should be fine. The only issue she may run into is the insurance company in the future may decline to cover any liability claims from this particular dog. Or, the insurance company could also non renew her home insurance because of this claim. Both are bad situations and not one you would want to find yourself in.  If you are adopting a dog make sure the breed you bring home is covered under your policy. You don't want to have a situation where your home insurance will deny a claim for your new furry friend.
The second call I heard was from an Englishman who called in because his fancy Jaguar got rear ended. How appropriate, an English guy driving a Jaguar. Was he drinking tea and eating a crumpet at the time of the accident too? I'd like to know. Now, the person who hit him only had 25 thousand property damage which is going to only cover a portion of a Jaguar if the car is a total loss. For whatever reason this guy hired a lawyer. He probably heard one of those cute jingles about calling an attorney first. After the lawyer collected his fee the Jaguar guy was left with 2 thousand dollars to cover his car and his well paid lawyer said, “hey buddy, just call your own insurance company and have them pay you for the rest” (not the actual conversation just an interpretation of what the lawyer might say). Ah, what great advice. Well, what English guy should have done is call the insurance company that hit him. They would have paid the 25 thousand to fix the car. If that wasn’t enough he should then call his insurance and they would pay the balance. Assuming, he had collision on the car. Now Handel seems to think Uninsured Motorist pays to fix the car. That is incorrect. The Property Damage pays to fix the car and the Uninsured Motorist pays for the drivers injuries. We never got to find out if the driver was claiming injuries. Handel pretty much gave him the same advice his attorney did, call your insurance company. One take away from this is make sure your Uninsured Motorist coverage is sufficient enough to cover your lost wages in case you get injured by someone with no insurance of low limits. And make sure your car is covered with collision. Both will make getting your car and your injuries taken care of much easier.
That’s all I had time to listen to. But, it was another exciting addition of "Handel on the Law". Check him out on KFI Saturday mornings around nine. His website is www.handelonthelaw.com. If you are looking for some insurance quotes don’t tune into the radio but give me a call at 951-395-0754. Keep those dogs on leashes people!