Unfortunately, not every driver on the road has liability insurance (despite a law that requires it). If you are injured by such a person in an accident, you may be able to recover damages from your own car insurance company.
Most car policies have uninsured motorist and underinsured motorist coverages for such situations. Typically, an uninsured motorist policy will pay compensatory damages for bodily injury which an insured person is legally entitled to recover from the owner or operator of an uninsured motor vehicle. Similarly, underinsured motorist insurance provides compensation for situations where there is not enough underlying coverage. It should be noted that insurance companies will pay no more than the purchased policy limit and coverages may have certain offsets and exclusions.
An injured person has no control over the amount of insurance a bad actor has available. However, one does have control over the amount of available uninsured motorist coverage when a policy is purchased. We have observed an advertising trend from insurance companies offering the “cheapest” coverages available. We have also learned of insurance companies representing policies as providing “full coverage” when in fact they only have minimal limits to protect the policyholder.
The tragic result to one who purchases minimal coverage is that when a serious life changing injury occurs, there may be no adequate source for compensation. The good news is that uninsured motorist and underinsured motorist policies are very inexpensive compared to other coverages.
Make sure you have sufficient uninsured and underinsured motorist coverage on your car policy. If an uninsured motorist injures you, compensation is still possible.