I believe my personal injury attorney has put their best interests ahead mine.
Location: Chandler AZ
I apologize for the lengthy post
I believe my personal injury attorney has put their best interests ahead mine. The back story is I (53M) was involved in a car collision on my way to work on Interstate 10 in Tempe AZ, 10/2/25. It was my day off but my supervisor requested I bring in a piece of equipment. My lawyer didn’t handle Worker’s Comp cases and referred me to another attorney for that part of the case. The lawyer he referred me to told me to file a WC claim then gave me the run around. When I told my personal injury attorney he implied it could be considered double dipping and therefore a waste of time having a workers comp claim as well as an auto insurance claim. So based on that I allowed the WC claim to be denied w/o appealing it within the 60 day time limit. I also ended up missing 3 months of work.
As far as the auto insurance claims the at fault party’s insurance eventually settled for the state minimum liability ($25k) and we’re currently pursuing a UIM claim. The demand letter has been sent for $100k and the insurance has approximately 2 weeks to respond. Also the medical bills come to $70k total. Between the bills and the lawyer fees there will be nothing left.
I’ve not yet sent the following email but I believe it’ll provide enough information to help you answer my questions :
Is this email proper to effectively get across my concerns or too aggressive?
If the lawyers negotiations with the medical providers doesn’t significantly reduce the costs what can I do?
Dear Lawyer,
How and why does a 3rd party collection agency have the authority to attempt to collect on a (non-negotiated full/overpriced)bill that the hospital submitted to my medical insurance? Seems fraudulent to me and that’s concerning. If it is fraud what is to be done about it if anything? Has there been any communication with my medical insurance, the provider, and/or the 3rd party collector?
I’m not feeling so confident about your ability to negotiate a lower price with these providers vs submitting everything for a claim with my medical insurance. For one I don’t feel my best interests are being looked out for. All the bills from the providers you sent me are ridiculously overpriced. When I mentioned using my insurance I was advised against it and told it would be better to allow y’all to negotiate with the providers. This advice came from your law firm and the providers themselves. Seems to me the only thing better is your financial relationship and future use of these providers.
The 3 months of lost wages (approximately $16,500) seems to be a lost cause. Yet at least part of those wages could have been recovered through worker”s comp. Which is another area my best interests weren’t looked out for because instead of advising me to file a claim I was lead to believe filing a WC claim would be double dipping and my lost wages would be covered by the UIM claim. Now of course it’s too late to appeal and I’ve lost that opportunity to make an appeal. I think yalll just didn’t want to split the money with another law firm.
This whole time I’ve been trying to resist this feeling that my legal representation and advisors have placed their interests before mine. However, when I blew up about my care being put on hold by your law firm not approving the procedures recommended I was told it was a miscommunication. So then I finally went in to get the procedure and when I asked about the next procedure I was told the same thing again your law firm wouldn’t approve it. I told y’all explicitly those were not decisions you were to make without consulting with me first.
I’m really at a loss here because I’ve lost trust. I’m not sure what to do about it but I will do something if I don’t see some interest in regaining that trust.