Today Attorney Ben Schwartz will answer a quick viewer question regarding File Closed, Case Over. It is a very frequent question that gets asked to personal injury attorneys. This question is from Rod in Dover Delaware, he says the insurance company says my file is closed, is that it? Is the case over?

The Insurance Company says my file is closed. Does that mean my case is over?

Hi, I’m Attorney Ben Schwartz,
Today, we are going to answer a quick viewer question. It is a very frequent question that gets asked to personal injury attorneys. This question is from Rod in Dover, Delaware, he says the insurance company says my file is closed, is that it? Is the case over? Let me just give you a little context on how this comes up. A lot of times, people get injured in a car accident and their auto insurance pays their medical bills and lost wages. And as they are recovering from their injuries the insurance companies paying those medical bills the insurance companies paying those lost wages.

So what happens sometimes, as people get to the point where they do not think they need any further medical treatment, they stop going to the doctor. A month later, or two months later, the injuries are not doing as well as they were and they go back to the doctor for more physical therapy or they go get more chiropractic treatment. If at that point, when they go to the insurance company to get payment for those bills, the insurance company says we are not paying for this, the file is closed. Sometimes they leave it go, sometimes they submit it to their health insurance, sometimes they go to their lawyer and they say, what is this all about? The insurance company is telling me my file is closed.

If an insurance company is telling you your file is closed, that does not mean anything. That is insurance company gobbledygook. What it means is that the insurance adjuster has marked the file as closed, and it is off her desk. It does not mean that you cannot get your bills paid. It does not mean that you cannot make a claim. It does not mean that anything is over, the fact they arbitrarily decided their file is closed. What it is, is a barrier. Everything in insurance is a numbers game.

If there are a million people a year making claims, and a million people a year are told the file is closed. Well, guess what? Something like ten thousand out of those million claimants are just going to throw their hands in the air and go away and leave it be, because they have been told by the insurance company the file is closed. So what it is, is just a false barrier to prevent you from getting your claim paid. What you need to do if you are told that the file is closed, is to send a letter to the adjuster. I would say certified mail, return receipt requested, or send it by fax and keep the fax receipt. Do it in a manner where you can prove that the letter was sent and received.

In this letter, you need the adjuster to open my file and pay my claims. If you are not going to pay the claims, give me something in writing and give me a legal basis for not paying the claims. You will know there are legal reasons why an insurance company would not pay otherwise valid claims. Maybe the insurance coverage ran out, but get it in writing. The fact that an insurance claims adjuster tells you over the phone that the file is closed, that does not mean anything.

I hate to give the impression that I am ranting and raving about insurance companies behaving badly. I swear to God, if insurance companies just did the right thing and paid valid claims and denied the claims that they had a legal basis to deny, there probably would not be any reason for personal injury lawyers to exist. You know, it just seems to me that a lot of what we do is counteracting the bad behavior of these insurance companies. They are supposed to be paying valid personal injury claims.

I’m Attorney Ben Schwartz. I hope you found this video informative and interesting. If you have a question you would like me to answer in video format, send me an e-mail below.
Thanks for watching and have a great day.