What you need to know about car insurance after a collision

LANSING, Mich. (WLNS) — If you’ve ever been in a car accident, you know about the complicated insurance claims process that comes with a crash.

And if you haven’t, attorney Bryan Waldman has some tips on what to know if it happens to you.

When you’ve Been involved in a crash in Michigan and there’s damage to your car or your vehicle because of the crash, the claims you have are going to be dependent on what type of insurance coverage you’ve purchased and who was at fault for the crash and other potential variables.

So, there’s two types of collision coverage typically. The first is standard. Standard simply means that if you get in a crash, it doesn’t matter who’s at fault, your insurance company pays for the repair, less the deductible on your policy, whatever the deductible is.

If you have paid additional money for what’s called broad collision coverage, then the difference between broad and standard is, if the crash is not your fault or primarily your fault, but primarily the fault of the other driver, then you will not owe the deductible. Your insurance company will take care of the whole thing.

You also have the right to bring what’s called a mini-tort claim, or a claim against the driver that’s at fault for the crash, or primarily at fault for the crash, for any repair costs that are not covered by any insurance — as long as you’re legally driving on the road with the requisite insurance and you’re not more than 50% at fault for the crash.

And so, a lot of times your insurance company will just waive your deductible, knowing that they can go to the other person’s insurance company, and recoup that $1,000 that won’t cost them anything.

But they’re doing you a favor by kind of processing that, so that you don’t have to. And so, you’re made whole between those two claims, your collision claims and what’s called the mini-tort claim against the other driver, or the other driver’s insurance company.

Now that doesn’t answer the question of what happens if you don’t have collision coverage. That’s another conversation and maybe we can cover that one next week because there’s answers to that question too.