When you’ve been injured in a car accident caused by another person’s negligence, the law offers you the possibility of getting compensation for your losses. One of the tricky parts of getting this compensation, however, is calculating everything that you are owed. Some things are straightforward to calculate, but pain and suffering can be more difficult. An experienced Atlanta car accident lawyer can help you ask for the right amount.
How Is Pain and Suffering Calculated in a Car Accident Claim?
1. The Multiplier Method
The multiplier method is the most common one, and it uses your economic damages as a reference point for calculating pain and suffering. “Economic damages” refers to those losses you have which are easy to prove with receipts and bills, such as your medical bills, your lost wages, or property that you had to have repaired or replaced. Pain and suffering are known as “non-economic damages”. To use the multiplier method to calculate your non-economic damages, your lawyer will total up the entire value of your economic damages and then multiply this by a number between one and five. The number chosen depends on the severity of your suffering.
For example, if you were in a minor fender bender that caused you some neck and back problems, which healed normally in a couple of weeks and only required a minimal amount of medical care and time away from work, and which didn’t cause you more pain than over-the-counter analgesics could handle, then your multiplier number might just be one or two. If your car accident permanently disabled you or caused you such catastrophic injuries that you require months of painful recovery and multiple major surgeries, then your number could easily rise to four or five.
So, in the first example above, if your medical bills, car repair, and lost time from work ended up costing you $12,000, your non-economic damages would add on another $12,000-$24,000. In the second example, your medical bills, car repair, and extensive time away from work could easily end up costing you more like $150,000. Once you multiply that by four or five, you might add on $600,000 to $750,000 to account for the pain, suffering, and mental anguish that you endured to go through all of that recovery.
2. The Per Diem Method
In this method, your lawyer helps you calculate an amount of money for each day that you suffered from the injuries. You then multiply this by the number of days that you were incapacitated and suffering. As with the multiplier method, the number that’s chosen will depend on how serious the injuries were. For very minor injuries, your per diem might be as low as $50 a day and only be applied to 60 days, making your pain and suffering damages about $3,000. For extremely serious injuries, it could be $300 or more and might end up being applied to hundreds of days.
The per diem method is less common than the multiplier method, but there are some situations when it is preferable. If your case has to go to court, for example, your lawyer may be asking a jury to award you the compensation you deserve. If you have largely recovered by the time your case comes to court, it may be difficult for the jury to really appreciate how much you have suffered, and the large, single number that is presented to them through the multiplier method may seem somehow “too big.” It may be much easier for them to understand and accept the idea of a smaller number that’s applied to every day that you were incapacitated. Your lawyer has a lot of experience in these situations and will advise you on the best choice for calculating your non-economic damages.
Factors That Determine Pain and Suffering Damages
Obviously, the more severe your injuries were and the longer they took to recover from, the greater the value of your pain and suffering damages. Calculating the severity is important to choosing the right multiplier number or the right per diem figure, but there does have to be a way of doing this. The question is normally how much the injury disrupted your life. For example, how did the injury impact your ability to work? How much distress did it cause your loved ones, and how much did it interfere with your ability to conduct your family life as you normally would? To what degree did you have to change up your daily life, and what hobbies and activities have you had to avoid because of your injury? How much pain did it cause you? Did it cause you to develop depression or anxiety?
You’ll need to provide some proof, here, like testimony from a therapist, co-workers, and family. Your personal feelings on the matter are certainly important, too. If you can keep a journal, this can greatly help. For example, your journal might contain entries like this:
“Normally, I would be going for a run at this time in the morning, but today I’m lying in bed, sweating with pain, and just waiting until I’m able to take my next pain pill.”
“My daughter has a soccer game today, but I’m not able to go. I can’t believe I don’t get to see her living life to the fullest and enjoying time with her friends. I can’t comfort her if she loses or celebrate with her if she wins.
These types of entries will actually demonstrate what you’re going through and will be more compelling than simply stating generally that your life was affected long after it’s all over.
Dealing With modified Comparative Negligence Rules
Georgia is a modified comparative negligence state. This means that everyone who is less than 50% at fault can collect damages, but the damages they collect will typically be reduced by the same percentage as their fault. This has to also be calculated into your pain and suffering damages.
For example, if one driver caused an accident by turning against the light, but you were texting at the time and didn’t react as quickly as you should have, the first driver will undoubtedly be held primarily responsible and may be given 80% or more of the fault. But you could be held at least partly responsible. If you were held 20% responsible, and the total amount of your economic and non-economic damages was $50,000, you would only be able to collect $40,000 in damages.
Working With an Atlanta Car Accident Lawyer
Your lawyer can investigate the accident itself to make sure that you are only assigned the amount of blame that you actually hold. You can expect the other driver and their insurance company to try to push as much blame onto you as possible to minimize their losses. Your lawyer will also make sure you don’t forget anything in your calculations and will fight hard for you in negotiations and in court, if it comes to that, so that you get everything you are owed.
