Oklahoma Injury Lawyer Blog

Oklahoma law is very clear on this.  The amount of coverage is reduced to what the premium would have purchased at the correct age.  (So you'll have less coverage).  This could actually be worse - I'm sure an insurance company has argued that the policy should be null and void if the insured lied (or was mistaken) about his/her age on the application. 

The relevant statute is: 36 Okla.Stat. § 4006.

Generally, yes.

The Oklahoma law on issue (42 OS 43):
The Hospital Lien applies to the amount recovered "whether by judgment or by settlement or compromise..." The amount is limited to the "reasonable and necessary" charges. 

The lien can't be enforced on Uninsured Motorists benefits however.  See: Kratz v. Kratz, 1995 OK 63.  The Court noted that 42 OS 43 "Hospital Liens in Personal Injury Cases" and reasoned that a "personal injury" means a claim against a third part or their insurer.

42 OS 44 requires a notice of the lien to be filed in the office of the county clerk in the county in which the hospital is located.  The notice must include:

1. Itemized statement of amount;
2. Name and address of injure patient;
3. Date of accident;
4. Name and location of hospital; and
5. Name of alleged liable party
   

It seems like several times a week I meet with someone that was just in a car accident that owes more on their car than it's worth.  Under Oklahoma law, the person that caused the accident does not have to pay what you owe on the car, but the fair market value of the car (assuming it was totaled).  How can you help protect against this scenario (and be stuck with car payments and no car!)?

Check out GAP Insurance.

Guaranteed Auto Protection (GAP) insurance pays the difference between the actual value of the car and the remaining balance on the loan.  Assuming the premium isn't too high, it's worth considering adding to your policy.

Everyone is aware of the grass fires that occurred last week throughout Oklahoma.  Are our insurance companies going to step up or follow a similar path to how the insurance companies in California responded to the wildfires there?

Check out the CBS video: Underinsured With Allstate

Among detailing the trouble Californians have had in getting their homes rebuilt, the video has some interesting statistics:

Allstate's Payout (how much is paid for every dollar the company's insureds pay in):

• 1987-1996: 73 cents on the dollar
• 1997-2006: 59 cents on the dollar ($4.9 billion profit in 2006)
  

More more reading on insurance companies, see: Home Insurers' Secret Tactics Cheat Fire Victims, Hike Profits:

The Bloomberg.com report states that:

"Insurers often pay 30-60 percent of the cost of rebuilding a damaged home -- even when carriers assure homeowners they're fully covered, thousands of complaints with state insurance departments and civil court cases show."

"As Mississippi Republican U.S. Senator Trent Lott and thousands of other homeowners have found, insurers make low offers -- or refuse to pay at all -- and then dare people to fight back."

Jeff Raymond's article, "Doctors flee state is simple a myth," was published yesterday in the Muskogee Phoenix.

He backs up his assertion with some relevant facts:

Oklahoma had 193 physicians per 100,000 people in 2003, according to American Medical Association statistics. By 2007 the ratio had grown to 200 per 100,000 people.

In 1998 Oklahoma had 6,412 physicians. By 2007 the number had grown to 7,245, an 11.5 percent increase.

Yesterday I posted information about the Yamaha Rhino ATV Recall.  Yamaha recalled the ATVs based on findings of the United States Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC).  What is this commission?

The CPSC is an independent agency of the US goverment that protects "against unreasonable risks of injuries associated with consumer products."  According to Wikipedia:

CPSC fulfills its mission to protect consumers against unreasonable risk of injury by developing voluntary and mandatory standards, banning dangerous consumer products, issuing recalls of products already on the market, and researching potential hazards associated with consumer products. CPSC learns about unsafe products in several ways. The agency maintains a consumer hotline and website through which consumers may report concerns about unsafe products or injuries associated with products. The agency also operates the National Electronic Injury Surveillance System, a probability sample of about 100 hospitals with 24-hour emergency rooms.  NEISS collects data on consumer product related injuries treated in ERs and can be used to generate national estimates.

Here is the offical site for the CPSC: http://www.cpsc.gov/

Settlement offers are almost always a part of the litigation process.  Sometimes settlement talks will fall through though.  If this happens, can one party use the opposing party's settlement offer as evidence to show that the party was at fault or did something wrong?

No.  The Oklahoma Evidence Code clearly states that this is inadmissible.  Check out the statute for the exact language: 12 O.S. § 2408.  Note that the rule does not require the exclusion of evidence that would otherwise be discoverable simply because it occurred during settlement negotiations. 

One of the reasons for this rule is that it encourages settlement. 

Yamaha Motor Corp. USA has recalled Rhino 450, 660, 700 ATVs.  The U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission determined that at least 46 deaths have been reported due to the faulty product design.  Even at low speeds, the ATVs are prone to rolling over.  The LA Times article states that:

The two-passenger Rhino has a built-in roll cage, but a narrow wheelbase and an anti-sway bar that can lift the rear tires off the ground during slow turns have caused many accidents.

More than two-thirds of the reported accidents were rollovers, many involving turns at low speeds and on level terrain, the commission statement said.