Practice Areas
Car Accident Claims in Austin, TX
Most Austin wrecks are fought over fault percentages and medical billing, not over whether the crash happened.
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What actually decides this kind of claim.
Almost no car accident claim turns on whether the collision happened. It turns on two numbers: what share of the fault gets assigned to you, and how much insurance money exists to reach. Both are decided in the weeks after the wreck, usually before anyone has hired a lawyer.
Texas assigns fault by percentage. Under the proportionate responsibility statute, Tex. Civ. Prac. & Rem. Code § 33.001, your recovery is reduced by your share of the blame, and at 51% you recover nothing at all. That single threshold is why an adjuster will call within days and ask open questions about your speed, your lane, and whether you saw the other car. Those answers become percentages.
How It Works
Tell us what happened
A conversation, not an intake form. What happened, what hurts, and what the insurer has already said to you.
Evidence gets locked down
Preservation demands go out for video, truck data, and records while they still exist. This is the step that cannot wait.
Treatment and documentation
You get care. The claim gets built around the medical record, because that record is what the injury is worth on paper.
Demand, negotiation, or suit
A documented demand goes to the carrier. If the number is not serious, the case gets filed before the deadline, not after.
The Part That Decides It
Where these claims are won and lost.
The second number is the policy. Texas requires drivers to carry only 30/60/25 under Tex. Transp. Code § 601.072: $30,000 for one person's injuries, $60,000 for everyone hurt in the crash, $25,000 for property. A hospital stay clears $30,000 quickly. When it does, the question stops being what your injuries are worth and becomes where else coverage can be found, which usually means your own underinsured motorist coverage, a second at-fault driver, or an employer whose driver was on the clock.
Underinsured motorist coverage is the most commonly overlooked asset in a Texas car wreck. Drivers pay for it for years without knowing they have it, and it does not pay automatically. It requires a separate claim against your own insurer, on the insurer's timeline, and it is the difference between a $30,000 ceiling and a real recovery in a serious-injury case.
Medical billing is the third front, and the one that surprises people. Health insurers and hospitals assert liens and subrogation rights against the settlement, so the number written on the check is not the number that reaches you. Reducing those claims is negotiated work that happens after liability is resolved and is often worth more to the client than the last few thousand dollars of the settlement itself.
The filing deadline sits underneath all of it. Section 16.003(a) gives two years from the date of the crash. Miss it and the strongest liability case in Travis County is worth nothing, because the defense will move to dismiss and win.
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What You Are Up Against
The adjuster is not asking how you are. They are assigning a percentage.
Texas reduces your recovery by your share of the fault, and eliminates it at 51%. The friendly early phone call is where that share gets built.
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Car Accidents, answered.
The other driver was clearly at fault. Do I still need to worry about my fault percentage?
Yes. Fault in Texas is apportioned by percentage under § 33.001, and the defense does not need to prove you caused the wreck. It only needs to move enough of the percentage onto you to reduce the payout, or to push you past 51% and eliminate it entirely. Clear liability cases still get argued down this way.
The insurance adjuster seems helpful and wants a recorded statement. Should I give one?
An adjuster is not neutral and the recorded statement is evidence. The questions that sound like sympathy ("were you in a hurry?", "did you see them coming?") are the questions that produce fault percentages later. You are not required to give a recorded statement to the other driver's insurer.
What if the at-fault driver only carried the state minimum?
Then $30,000 is the ceiling on that policy for your injuries, and the case becomes a search for other coverage. The usual sources are your own underinsured motorist coverage, a second negligent party, or an employer if the driver was working at the time. This is why identifying coverage early matters more than arguing liability early.
How long do I actually have to file?
Two years from the date of the collision, under Tex. Civ. Prac. & Rem. Code § 16.003(a). A handful of exceptions can change that date, and claims against a governmental unit carry much shorter notice deadlines, sometimes as short as six months. The safe assumption is that your deadline is earlier than you think.
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Car Accidents
Two years to file. Far less than that to save the evidence.
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