To file a claim with someone else’s car insurance, get the at-fault driver’s insurer, policy number, and policyholder details at the scene, report the accident to that insurer promptly, gather documentation of your injuries and vehicle damage, and send a written demand for a specific dollar amount once you know the full extent of your losses. One caveat before you start: if you live in Florida, Hawaii, Kansas, Kentucky, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, New Jersey, New York, North Dakota, Pennsylvania, or Utah, you’re in a no-fault state, and your own personal injury protection coverage pays your medical bills first regardless of who caused the crash. In those states, you generally can’t pursue the other driver’s insurer for pain and suffering unless your injuries meet a “serious injury” threshold set by state law, though property damage claims against the other driver’s insurer still work normally.
Get the Other Driver’s Insurance Information
At the scene, collect the insurer’s name, the policy number, and the policyholder’s name and contact information. Every state requires drivers to carry proof of insurance, so this is usually printed on a card in the vehicle. If the other driver won’t cooperate or leaves, a police report will typically capture what the officer can gather, including the license plate — enough for your own insurer to track down the policy later.
Once you have the insurer’s name, call and confirm the policy is active. Ask about the liability limits, because those numbers cap what you can recover. State-mandated minimums for bodily injury run from as low as $10,000 per person up to $50,000, and property damage minimums range from $5,000 to $25,000.1Insurance Information Institute. Automobile Financial Responsibility Laws By State Plenty of drivers carry only the minimum, which won’t cover a serious crash.
If the Other Driver Is Uninsured or Underinsured
When the at-fault driver has no coverage or not enough, your own uninsured/underinsured motorist (UM/UIM) coverage fills the gap. About 20 states and the District of Columbia require UM/UIM; elsewhere it’s optional.2Insurance Information Institute. Facts and Statistics – Uninsured Motorists Without it, your remaining option is suing the driver personally, which is only worth the effort if they have assets or income a court can attach.
If Your Losses Exceed the Policy Limits
The other driver’s insurer will pay up to the cap and consider the claim closed. From there, check whether the at-fault driver carries an umbrella or excess liability policy that sits above the standard limits. You can also tap your own underinsured motorist coverage. Suing the driver directly is the last resort, and collecting depends on what they own.
Consider Filing Through Your Own Insurer Instead
You aren’t required to file against the other driver’s insurance. If you carry collision coverage, you can file a first-party claim with your own insurer. Your insurer pays for repairs (minus your deductible), then chases the at-fault driver’s insurer through subrogation to recover what it paid, including your deductible if the effort succeeds.
The advantage is speed and cooperation: your own insurer has a contract with you and moves the claim along, while the other driver’s insurer owes you nothing and has every reason to delay or lowball. The tradeoff is paying the deductible upfront and possibly getting back only a partial share of it if subrogation recovers less than the full amount. Filing with your own insurer also makes sense when fault is contested, because the other insurer may deny liability outright while yours still pays under collision.
These aren’t either/or choices. You can run a first-party claim for vehicle damage through your collision coverage and a third-party claim against the other driver’s insurer for medical bills, lost income, and pain and suffering at the same time.
Report the Accident to the Other Driver’s Insurer
Call the at-fault driver’s insurance company as soon as you can. Give them the date, time, and location of the crash, the other driver’s policy number, and the police report number if one exists. The insurer will open a claim and assign a claims adjuster.
Most states require insurers to acknowledge a claim within roughly 15 to 30 days and to complete their investigation within 30 to 45, with extensions allowed for complicated cases. Unexplained delays beyond those windows may themselves be a regulatory violation in your state.
Don’t Give a Recorded Statement
The adjuster will almost certainly ask for a recorded statement. You aren’t required to provide one to the other driver’s insurer. Your own policy may require cooperation as a condition of coverage; the at-fault driver’s insurer has no such hold on you.
Adjusters are trained to ask questions that steer you toward admissions of partial fault or statements that downplay your injuries. Injuries evolve — what seems minor on day two may need surgery months later — and a recorded statement locks in a description you can’t walk back. If the claim ends up in litigation, the recording is discoverable and can be used to undercut your testimony. Talk to an attorney before agreeing to any recording.
Documentation That Decides Your Payout
Adjusters value claims on paper evidence, not your description. Treat every receipt, photograph, and medical note as money.
Police Report
The police report is the foundation. It captures the parties, insurance information, witness statements, road conditions, and the officer’s preliminary assessment of fault. Request a copy from the responding agency. If something is wrong — a misspelled street, a bad description of where the vehicles ended up — contact the department for a correction or addendum. The adjuster leans heavily on this document.
Medical Records and Bills
If you were hurt, get medical attention immediately and keep every record: emergency room evaluations, imaging, prescriptions, physical therapy notes, specialist referrals, and follow-up visits. Gaps in treatment give adjusters an argument that the injuries weren’t serious. Save every invoice and explanation of benefits. For lasting injuries, a written prognosis from your doctor tying the condition to the accident carries real weight.
Photos and Dashcam Footage
Photograph everything at the scene: damage from multiple angles, skid marks, traffic signals, road signs, weather, and visible injuries. If your car has a dashcam, save the footage right away. Many dashcams overwrite older files, and that video may be the clearest proof of what happened. Keep the original file intact with timestamps and GPS metadata, and don’t trim or edit it. Altered footage can be thrown out entirely.
Review the footage before you hand it over. If it shows you speeding, on your phone, or otherwise contributing to the crash, the other insurer will use it against you.
Damage Estimates
Get repair estimates from at least two shops. The insurer will run its own inspection and may push back on your numbers, so independent assessments strengthen your position. Photos of your vehicle from before the accident help establish its pre-crash condition.
How Shared Fault Cuts Your Recovery
If you bear any blame, your state’s negligence rule determines what you can collect. About a dozen states use pure comparative negligence: you can recover no matter how much fault you carry, but your award drops by your percentage of fault. Seventy percent at fault on a $100,000 loss still nets you $30,000.3Justia. Comparative and Contributory Negligence Laws – 50-State Survey
More than 30 states use modified comparative negligence, which works the same way but cuts you off once your fault hits 50 or 51 percent, depending on the state. Cross that line and you recover nothing.3Justia. Comparative and Contributory Negligence Laws – 50-State Survey
Five jurisdictions — Alabama, Maryland, North Carolina, Virginia, and the District of Columbia — still follow contributory negligence, the harshest rule. One percent of fault bars you from recovering anything. In those places, fighting even a small fault allocation is worth the effort.
Send a Demand Letter
Once your treatment is complete or you’ve reached maximum medical improvement and you know your total losses, send a written demand letter to the adjuster. This formally opens settlement negotiations. A vague or thinly supported demand invites a lowball counter.
A strong demand letter contains:
- Header information: your name and contact details, the claim number, the adjuster’s name, and the at-fault driver’s policy number.
- A clear factual account of the accident, supported by the police report and witness statements.
- A liability argument explaining why the other driver is at fault, pointing to specific evidence.
- An injury and treatment summary covering each injury, the care received, the current status, and any long-term prognosis. This is usually the longest section.
- An itemized financial summary of every economic loss — medical bills, lost wages, property damage, rental car costs — with supporting documents attached.
- A description of non-economic damages: pain, emotional distress, and how the injuries have affected daily life.
- A specific settlement demand, set higher than your bottom line to leave room for negotiation.
Send the letter even when you expect a counter. It creates a paper trail, forces the adjuster to respond in writing, and frames the negotiation on your terms.
Negotiate the Counteroffer
The adjuster will review the demand and come back with a lower number. First offers are a starting point, not a final position. Respond with a specific counter of your own, backed by the documentation you already have. Point out anything the adjuster ignored or undervalued.
Adjusters typically push on three fronts: the severity of your injuries, whether the treatment was necessary, and your share of fault. If they question medical expenses, hand over the treating physician’s notes explaining why each procedure was needed. If they assign you partial fault, push back with the police report, witness statements, and any video. Keep every counter in writing. Phone conversations leave no record of what the adjuster conceded.
Negotiations can stretch across weeks or months. If you stall out, options include escalating to the adjuster’s supervisor, filing a complaint with your state’s insurance department, or hiring an attorney to file suit.
What a Fair Settlement Should Cover
Don’t accept an offer until you’ve checked every category of loss. Adjusters structure offers to look reasonable while quietly leaving out categories you didn’t raise.
Medical Expenses
Every treatment cost tied to the accident: emergency care, surgery, hospital stays, prescriptions, physical therapy, imaging, and any future care your doctor says you’ll need. Future costs should rest on a written prognosis, not the adjuster’s guess.
Lost Income
Wages missed during recovery, including sick days and vacation time you used. If the injuries reduce your ability to work long-term or force a career change, the settlement should account for that reduced earning capacity.
Vehicle Repairs or Replacement
The cost of restoring the vehicle to its pre-accident condition, or its fair market value if totaled — whichever is less. If the insurer’s valuation looks low, challenge it with comparable sales listings and an independent appraisal.
Rental Car and Loss of Use
You’re generally entitled to a rental car or compensation for loss of use while your vehicle is being repaired, paid from the at-fault driver’s liability coverage. Keep the receipts and return the car promptly once repairs are done, because insurers will resist reimbursement for days they consider unnecessary.
Diminished Value
A vehicle with an accident on its history is worth less on resale than an identical vehicle without one, even after a quality repair. That loss is called diminished value, and in many states you can claim it against the at-fault driver’s liability insurance as part of your property damage recovery. Proving it typically takes a professional appraisal comparing your vehicle’s post-repair value to similar accident-free vehicles. Not every state recognizes the claim and some make it hard to prove, but it’s worth raising, especially on newer or higher-value vehicles.
Pain and Suffering
Non-economic damages cover physical pain, emotional distress, anxiety, and lost enjoyment of life. There’s no single formula. The more thoroughly you’ve documented how the injuries changed your daily life, the harder it is for the adjuster to minimize this number.
Read the Release Before You Sign
When you accept a settlement, the insurer will ask you to sign a release of all claims. It’s final. Once signed, you can’t return to the insurer or the at-fault driver for more money, even if a new injury surfaces later or your condition worsens beyond anyone’s expectation.
Read the release carefully. Confirm it covers every category of damage you negotiated and that the dollar figure matches what you agreed to. If any medical issues haven’t fully resolved, think hard about whether the settlement covers future treatment. This is the moment to have an attorney review the document if you haven’t hired one already. A few hundred dollars in legal fees can save thousands.
Watch the Statute of Limitations
If the claim stalls or the final offer isn’t acceptable, you may have to sue. Every state sets a statute of limitations — a hard deadline after which you lose the right to sue at all. For car accident claims, most states give you two or three years from the crash date, though some allow as little as one and others up to six. Missing the deadline by a day ends the case regardless of its merits. Certain circumstances can pause the clock, but the exceptions vary by state and are risky to rely on without legal advice. Treat the standard deadline as absolute and file well before it.
When to Hire an Attorney
Straightforward property damage claims with clear liability often resolve without a lawyer. Several situations justify hiring one:
- Serious or long-term injuries, particularly when medical bills are substantial or your ability to work is affected.
- Disputed liability, where the insurer blames you for some or all of the accident and you disagree.
- Lowball offers that don’t come close to your documented losses after negotiation has stalled.
- Bad faith tactics, including unreasonable delay, denial of a valid claim without explanation, or refusal to settle within policy limits despite clear liability. Bad faith can expose the at-fault driver to liability beyond their policy limits, and in egregious cases courts may award punitive damages.4Justia. Insurance Bad Faith Law
- No-fault threshold disputes, where the insurer argues your injuries don’t meet the serious injury threshold.
Most personal injury attorneys work on contingency, typically taking about a third of the settlement rather than charging upfront fees. You pay nothing if you don’t recover, and the attorney has a financial incentive to maximize your payout.