I met with a new client (let's call her Jane Smith) last week that mentioned the insurance adjuster on her claim told her that "she doesn't want to get an attorney involved because your claim will likely take longer and you'll have to pay the attorney out of your settlement." That just means the insurance adjuster didn't want Jane to hire an attorney. The insurance adjuster is looking to pay Jane as little as possible - settling early for cheap saves the insurance company money.
I've seen several personal attorney websites state something along the lines of: "a national study showed that injured people represented by an attorney received 300% more than persons who settle without a lawyer." None of the websites that have this actually provide a cite to the study. So, I posted the quote on a national trial lawyer discussion group to see if anyone has actually seen the study.
Hat-tip to Solomon Neuhardt, a Montana car accident attorney, for pointing out what appears to be the study. At the very least, it's a study discussing represented and unrepresented claimants. The "Allstate's 'customer service' charade" article was written by David Strickland and appeared in Trial Magazine in 1999.
The article mentions a study by the Insurance Research Council:
The study found that payments for unrepresentedThat's 366%! Assuming the attorney's fees in those claims were 33%, the clients still recovered $4737 more than what they would have recovered.
claimants with bodily injuries amounted to $3,262 on average. Payments
to represented claimants amounted to $11,939 on average.
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