Sarasota Uninsured Motorist Accident Attorney

So a driver can run a red light in Sarasota, injure you badly, be cited at the scene, and have no coverage that pays a cent toward your medical bills or your lost income. Add the drivers carrying only minimum limits and the drivers who let a policy lapse, and a large share of serious crashes here involve nowhere near enough insurance on the other side.

I am David Harris, and I have handled Sarasota County injury claims since 2003. Explaining this is one of the harder conversations in the job, because it usually happens after someone has already been told they have a clear case.

Uninsured and underinsured motorist coverage is the answer, and you may already have it. Florida insurers must offer it, and it applies unless you rejected it in writing, so a lot of drivers carry it without remembering. It covers you in your car, as a passenger in someone else's, and as a pedestrian or cyclist.

Two things about it are worth understanding before you need them.

Stacking. If you insure more than one vehicle, stacked coverage multiplies the available limit across those vehicles. Stacked is the default in Florida and non-stacked requires a signed rejection, which is often signed without much explanation at the point of sale.

Underinsured, not just uninsured. The coverage also fills the gap when the at-fault driver has a policy that is simply too small for the injury. That is the more common scenario.

A UM claim is made against your own insurance company. The relationship changes the moment you file it. The company that has taken your premiums for years is now the party deciding what your injury is worth, and its interest runs the other way from yours.

That means recorded statements, requests for your complete medical history, an independent medical examination chosen and paid for by the insurer, and the same arguments about pre-existing conditions and gaps in treatment that any defendant makes. None of it is personal. It is simply how the claim works, and people are frequently caught off guard because they expected to be treated as a customer.

Consent also matters. Settling with the at-fault driver's insurer without your UM carrier's written agreement can wipe out the UM claim entirely, because it destroys the carrier's right to pursue that driver. That is a trap worth knowing about before a cheque is offered.

The crash report is confidential for sixty days under section 316.066, released in that window to the people involved and their representatives.

Most people do not know whether they carry UM, or whether it is stacked. It takes one phone call to find out and it changes everything about what a crash costs you. If you have already been hurt and been told the other driver had nothing, call me and we will look at your policy together. There is no fee unless you recover.