How Much Will I Get for a Personal Injury Settlement?

No doubt you have seen, in real life and in fiction, people being awarded millions of dollar in damages for some injury someone else caused. In real life however, multi-million dollar settlements are not the norm. For instance, Jury Verdict Research found that in Michigan last year, the average personal injury award was $1,089,638. However, the median personal injury compensation award in Michigan is $99,506. That means half the people who won a settlement got more than $99,000...and the other half got less than that. A personal injury lawyer, Michigan-based or otherwise, is best qualified to tell you what a likely settlement might be, but here is the general formula used to determine a personal injury settlement.

What's a Damage?

The primary factor in estimating a settlement is the type of damages that must be compensated. At a minimum, you are are entitled to compensation for things like:

• medical care and related expenses
• income lost because of the accident, because of time spent unable to work or undergoing medical treatment for injuries
• permanent physical disability or disfigurement
• loss of family, social, and educational experiences, including missed school or training, vacation or recreation, or a special event
• emotional damages, such as stress, embarrassment, depression, or strains on family relationships -- for example, the inability to take care of children, anxiety over the effects of an accident on an unborn child, or interference with sexual relations, and
• damaged property.

The person who is liable for an accident must pay an injured person for these damages.And this usually starts with the injuring person's liability insurance company. Some things like medical expenses are easy to add up. Putting a dollar figure on pain and suffering is harder. That's where an insurance company's damages formula comes in.

The Formula that Insurance Companies Use for Damages

First, an insurance adjuster adds up the total medical expenses related to the injury. These expenses are referred to as "medical special damages" or simply "specials." That's the base figure the adjuster uses to figure out how much to pay the injured person for pain, suffering, and other nonmonetary losses, which are called "general" damages.

The adjuster takes teh special damages and multiplies them by some number to determine the general damages.

When the injuries are relatively minor, the adjuster multiplies the amount of special damages by 1.5 or 2. When the injuries are particularly painful, serious, or long-lasting, the adjuster multiplies the amount of special damages by up to 5, however, the multiplier may be as great as 10 in extreme cases.

The adjuster then adds on any income that has been lost as a result of the injuries.

That's all there is to the formula.

Percentage of Fault

Now fault does come into play. The extent each person is at fault is the most important factor affecting how much the insurance company is likely to pay.

Determining fault for an accident is not an exact science, but in most claims both you and the insurance adjuster will at least have a good idea whether the insured person was entirely at fault, or if you were a little at fault, or if you were a lot at fault. Whatever that rough percentage of your comparative fault might be -- 5%, 50%, 80% -- is the amount by which the damages formula total will be reduced to arrive at a final figure.

Keep in mind these is just an estimate. In the end, other factors can affect your settlement including the jury's decision (if trial occurs) and your personal injury attorney's fee, usually somewhere around 33%.