Alabama lawyers: under the hospital lien statute (we call them Alabama super liens here) , does a hospital like USA get to balance bill? I.e. can they accept payment from medicaid and then claim a lien for the outstanding balance against an MVA?
Now they have to submit to a collateral source payor before perfecting their lien: https://cumberlandtrialjournal.com/2019/12/23/alabamas-amended-hospital-lien-laws/
RJF-GUMP I misspoke a little bit. They can, in limited situations (like when a certain procedure isn't covered or something like that), but it has to account for the reduction of the bill on their contract. They can only claim what wasn't covered/paid, not the difference between the retail charge and the actual collateral source payment.
I've determined that being a WC attorney is kind of like having 120 kids and they're all yelling "DADDY DADDY DADDY" at the same time while trying to get your attention and ask you for something.
There is no stupider fucking way to evaluate cases than jury verdict research. High exposure cases don't try. Juries are dumb. It's always the geriatric fucks that believe there is any benefit to this.
That’s not how they use those numbers. They use a formula for overall verdict coupled with factors like your chances of winning to calculate a settlement value.
Meh, I know that formula and have used it before. I've had adjusters tell me to omit defense verdicts/only include high cases, which seems...less than accurate. I generally only do it for clear liability, high exposure cases. Mainly FXG.
What the hell does it mean when an insurance defense firm has its lawyers divided into associates, special counsel, and directors? None of them are listed as partners. This is a big firm. OC on one of my cases is a "special counsel" but I thought he was a partner.
Directors are equity partners, special counsel is non-equity lawyers billing at a "partner" rate, and associates are associates. They're called directors because of the business entity.
Good to know. Sounds like OC is an income partner as opposed to equity partner. But he's my age I think, so around 35, and it's my understanding that at big insurance defense firms not a ton of people are equity partners at that age.
Here's a first for me: I have a hearing on a petition to settle the MVA claim of a minor child coming up in a few weeks. I noticed today that the check was sent from Progressive in August and says it expires in 90 days. Emailed adjuster and told her to send me a new check as the old one expired. She told me that they never expire and to not worry about the whole 90 day thing
With the Democrats taking the Senate, I wonder how federal judiciary appointments and confirmations are going to go in the next two years with the chance that the GOP overtakes the Senate again in 2023. Moreso creating more district judgeships, elderly Democratic circuit judges retiring so younger ones can be appointed, etc. And while court packing SCOTUS will be a big debate, Breyer is 82 years old. I wonder how he'll view everything that went down with RBG and what that means for him. It'll be interesting after everything that's happened over the last 4 years.
wes tegg , y'all just came in on a case I've got in Greene. Tell Rad to open the purse strings. COVID is killing me.
Workers comp question: In other states can a claimant elect to have temporary total disability checks direct deposited? What states? I’m either going to get a declaratory opinion from our comp commission on this or introduce legislation. We’re in a legislative session right now. The mail has been absurdly slow for months now and claimants are getting really far behind on bills due to TTD payments arriving weeks late. carriers claim they send them timely and they aren't set up for direct deposit.
Direct deposit in GA is optional and most insurers don’t offer it. Only a few do. It’s fucking horrible how often my clients checks are arriving weeks later and I’m the one getting blamed for it.
I'll let you know how my legislative efforts go . I'm drafted some language for an amended to the statute.
These fucking assholes are really going to wait until the day before the start of the spring semester to give back our grades. What a relaxing, enjoyable 3.5 weeks it has been.
Question for all of you experienced with car insurance and insurers. Mom got rear ended around Thanksgiving in a minor fender bender. Rear bumper needs repairs, but nothing major so no police report was filed. She got a quote for the repair and was waiting to hear back from other person's car insurer after the holidays. Earlier this week, she got rear ended again in an incident that was also not her fault. This time, a police report was filed. The most recent incident involves a different insurance company. She was planning on trading in the car in a few months, so now she's wondering about the loss in value due to the wrecks, especially the most recent one given that it'll most likely show up on Carfax. Any thoughts on how to go about this and recouping the loss in value from the insurance company? Is that a thing? Seems like it's going to be a he said/she said mess, and may not be worth the time but nevertheless figured it was worth asking here.
Loss of value is tough to prove, but easy to argue. Tell her to just demand compensation for it and use a KBB value with no accidents v. one with an accident to show the difference. If it comes down to it, you can file a small claims case for her and just plead to the lawyer who draws it.
That's exactly what I was thinking re: KBB, but I doubt this is worth small claims. Although, she's retired and bored, so maybe she's up for it. Thanks
I have a pretty good diminution of value expert out of Mobile if you need him, but he'd probably eat up your profits unless she was driving a Bentley or something.
Thanks but yeah highly unlikely to be worth it. These are fender benders and the car is still driving. I am simply trying to anticipate the loss in value so she's not complaining to me in 6 months when nows her chance to get more than cost of repairs.
Here, diminution of value claims on property damage in auto cases are tough unless it's a newer vehicle that was worth a decent amount. Not gonna get you far with a 2010 Toyota Camry etc. I don't think I've ever gotten anything out of a carrier for it. But 90+% of the time I don't have to deal with property damage because the client is able to work it out with the carrier directly.
Just went fucking offff on a lawyer for one of the counties around Houston we settled a case in late September and signed a release on 10/7 he told us it would have to get approved by the county commissioners and we were like ok we know it’s a process He’s either forgotten to go in front of the commissioners to get it approved or made up excuses about it for the last three months. Now it’s another two weeks because I don’t even know the excuse I think because someone else made We’ve been nothing but cordial until the excuse today and I basically said figure this out today or I’m suing you personally and telling my client to go to the bar Legit no idea what else to do
if anyone thinks i'm being dramatic: Sept 2 – Accepted Offer Sept 9 – Told they could not get the case before the commissioner’s court for approval until Sept 22 Sept 24 – got told that judge had an accident and that the case would not go b/f commissioner’s court until Oct 6; attached blank release Oct 6 – told commissioner’s court would be R/S b/c they needed a signed release from us; never said this prior – we were waiting on approval before getting CL to sign off on the release Oct 14 – sent executed release Oct 21 – sent FU on commissioner’s court Oct 28 – sent FU on commissioner’s court; told it would go before the court on Nov 10 Nov 4 – told it was R/S to go before the court on Nov 17 Nov 18 – told it had to be postponed until the next court on Dec 8 Dec 8 – said that it was approved but had to go back before the court to get funding source; said this would take place on Dec 15 Dec 15 – told that they had to R/S the court for Jan 12 in order for them to issue the funds Jan 13 – said that everything is set up an check should be issued in the next few days Jan 13 - said would be postponed until next court date on Jan 26 and could courier us the check
In my experience these chicken shits will use the "approval" process to chisel you a little bit right before you actually get the money. Then they can go back to their client and feel good about saving them 10k or something absurd. Happened to me in Arizona.
Most these guys make 40k a year and absolutely hate themselves. They do not care about you, the client or frankly anything.
he apparently is going to wire the $ to my IOLTA after threatening to have my client contact the bar and sue him personally. was drafting a petition to send him this afternoon when he offered that alternative.
of course he hasn't initiated the wire and ignored my follow up email half an hour ago. Giving him another 20 minutes and then sending the draft petition to him.
back on the interview circuit one interview with a plaintiffs firm that does mass tort (nfl head injury, tobacco lit + other stuff) one with a big defense/civil litigation firm. The civil litigation firm's billing goal is 2050 hours. Really hoping the plaintiff's firm comes through with an offer.
If I was going to file something it would be a motion to enforce the settlement and for fees and sanctions.
another law firm hired a group of nurses to review my client's medical bills. the nurses are from nebraska and atlanta. i really dont understand why these defense firms/adjusters think it is a good idea to hire docs from other states when houston has one of the largest medical centers, if not the largest, in the world. haven't tried one of these yet but i've taken a couple of depos and i think they've all gone terrible for the defense. half of them have never been to texas and not a single one has been able to answer which county the litigation is in.
she is obviously very good at this. her note on the anesthesia bill is "This bill was submitted by a practice management company for the Surgical Center for services on 7/20/18. This appears to be a duplicate bill." good job.
I would do this especially if you're in Harris or even Montgomery County. In either scenario the judge is going to set him on fire.
I'd have to dig it up in the verdict reporter but there was a trial in MS not long ago where defense hired an expert to say the medical bills were inflated and the whole strategy blew up in their face
i get hiring a local doc to say that. i do not understand at all why they would go to someone 1000 miles away. in a different case i took the depo of an nurse in california who reviewed the bills and it was probably my favorite one to date. said she spent 22 hours creating a 50 page report where it's really just data entry of CPT codes. had never been to texas. had no idea what county we are in. could not reference the studies/reports used to justify her numbers. in the same case they hired an ortho who specializes in extremities to talk about my client's neck issues. like what are yall doing here???
a local doc would probably screw up his career if he went around testifying that other local docs were inflating charges or doing unnecessary billing