NPC: Accident, insurance claim advise, Help me not get screwed! Options

[Dr Evil]

I know that there are some people on here that are lawyers and insurance adjusters and I was hoping that some of you could help me.
The story:
I was exiting the freeway (805N to Balboa West) when a guy with a little nissan truck decided that he wanted to be where I was in the exit lane. He merged into me and totaled my bike. Winesses say that I got 10' of air, but I don't remember that part. There is no question of who was at fault and his company has accepted total responsability. The adjuster is coming over on wednesday to look at my personal effects that were destroyed/damaged during my dancing lesson with the truck. Items include: Watch, cell phone, boots, helmet, jacket, and pants. Nothing that crazy, and I am not claiming to have been waring a Rolex.
The problem (bend over) (IMG:style_emoticons/default/mad.gif) :
The adjuster is already talking about "depreciated value" for my effects. I have been hit by one RV, one car, and now a truck and I have never heard of an adjuster offereing depreciated value for a helmet, pants, watch, etc. How the hell do you figure out the depreciated value?

(hypothetical)Him, "well, from what is left of your pants, I can tell that they were purchased two years ago (even though they are the same type available today and are not that old). So, well figure $40 as the original price minus $21 a year since jeans are a work type of clothing, leaving you owing us $2 for hitting you <_< "

My effects are not expensive ones, and I would like to just get enough to replace with the exact same make and model. Is this fair? What is my recourse if I do not agree?

I also did not go to the emergency room as I am pretty knowledgable about emergency medicine and assesed my self. I did this for many reasons; I dont believe in clogging the ER for superficial wounds that I KNOW how to treat, I dont believe in going to the ER to get a bigger settlement, I had no intention of getting a lawyer to sue for "three times the amount". I like to be responsable and to only collect on what I am due. I am getting the feeling that I should have sued the crap out of them.

With not going to an ER it seems that I am not going to get any pain and suffering either. All I want is the $425 that my salvage cost me, not thousands. Do I have a claim for pain and suffering? I was messed up for a little over a week, and was missing part of my hide, but that is almost all grown back by now.

Any help would be greatly appreciated.
-Mike

[ArtechnikA]

... if I take exquisite care of, say, my watch and then I am no longer able to use it and it is "too old" to be truly compensable then how fair is it that "oh well" you lose.

...All of this trouble and he may save $150-200 tops
... seems to me to be extrordinarily petty.

...Since the items are cheap, could I sue the company in small claims?

this is where apprasials come in handy, or if you had a personal inventory of your stuff for insurance purposes. yeah, i don't have a list like that either, but i know i should...

the standard that's typically applied in law is the 'reasonable person' standard -- a reasonable person would say "Sheesh - the guy got hit - give him a hundred bucks for a new watch" - which is one reason why insurance companies love to wait you out and very rarely actually go to trial.

they aren't set up to do what they claim to do, which is just make you whole after a loss. you'd think it would be simple, but you have to understsand how the insurance companies work - they take in the money insureds pay in as premiums - and then they just keep it.

(my ex- got rear-ended, and although the at-fault driver's insurance paid to have the car fixed, she had a knee injury (torn PCL) that required arthroscopic inspection and - since she was not a profesional athlete and PCL reconstruction was not indicated, a brace. it took 3 years, the intervention of one of California's top bad-faith litigators, and a courthouse-steps settlement for them to agree to do what they could have done 3 years earlier and avoided all the legal fees. but an insurance company's on-retainer law firm is not going to advise their client to settle early - not when they're billing $250/hr until they do!)

theoretically, you could sue in small claims but the problem with suing corporations is that there's no "one" to sue. i doubt this system, set up by trial lawyers in the legislature, works that way by accident ... you could find someone to take the case on contingency, maybe, but the value is so low it'd be hard getting someone interested. is there a police report ? do you have witness statements ?

when you said 'bike' earlier, do you actually mean a bicycle (in which case i'm a little confused, because i thought i understood you to say you were exiting the freewar) or is it a motorcycle in which case there may be compensable damage to that?

you are under no obligation to accept any settlement offer you do not consider fair, waiving all future rights -- but they are under no obligation to keep raising the offer until you do, and in the meanwhile - they have the money.

you may have to escalate to a district supervisor type who can see past the low-level stuff and simply authorise payment, because at some point they will realise that they will lose in court (by which time he'll be retired and it won't be his problem anyway.)

keep copies of everything. if you call them and you get the standard voicemail recording telling you that the conversation may be recorded "for training and quality control purposes" - you have just been given permission to record the call. do it. have the tape running at the beginning of the call so you capture that portion. if you don't get that, tell the person you want to record the call 'to make sure you got everything they siad accurately...' sign nothing. accept no verbal agreements - if it's not in writing, it doesn't exist. use certified mail.

my 356 got rear-ended and pushed into the vehicle in front of me. it was obviously the fault of the car full of teenage kids who slammed into me. too bad for me - they were also hit in the back after stopping short from high speed. the person at the very back of that line was uninsured. the kids who hit me claimed they "were hit from behind and pushed into me." this despite the fact that the only heavy damage was to the back of my car and they front of theirs - the very back person was driving an early VW Beetle and the flimsy front bumper overriders were barely bent. the kids' insurance company absolutely denied any responsibility and was totally unimpressed by the location and extend of the damage, even though it made no sense. he eventually told me, "and you can bring whatever expert witnesses you want, because we have expert witnesses that will say what we want."

i got ZIP out of that incident, and the 356 carries the collision damage to this very day. i think it'll probably cost me $20,000 to put right.