Before I start the article I would like to quickly introduce myself since this is the first article I am posting to this site. My name is Clark Schoeder and I am the President/CEO of Cerberus Subrogation Professionals, LLC. We are a company that helps commercial trucking companies, owner/operators, and commercial auto insurance companies recover money that is owed to them by other insurance companies. I am going to be writing articles on trucking insurance, the issues truckers face in the insurance industry, and how you can protect your recovery interests. I hope you find these articles helpful and come back to check out future posts. Let’s get to the article.

I suppose we will start at the beginning. What should a driver do when they are involved in an accident to protect themselves and their company?

1.) Do not admit fault to anyone other than your safety department or your insurance company. This includes saying something as simple as “I’m sorry”. I have seen cases lost because the other party has a witness saying that the truck driver admitted fault at the scene even though they were not at-fault for the accident. I cannot stress this enough. Let the insurance company determine which party is at-fault.

2.) Do not talk to the other driver about the accident. You should only ask them if they are hurt and if they need medical assistance. If they say “yes” to either of those questions call 911 and request medical assistance. Beyond that, exchange your insurance information and say nothing else.

3.) Call the police. This is important for a number of reasons.

A.) The police officer is going to write a police report detailing what happened in the accident. The police report is one of the most important pieces of evidence used to determine liability. If you plan on having the other party’s insurance pay for your damages, you are going to need a police report. There is no way around it.

B.) It is going to create a record of the other party’s account of the accident. This will protect you from the other party changing their story down the line. More often than not, people will admit fault to the police officer and then change their story when they talk to their insurance company. It is human nature to avoid blame. The police report will create a record of their initial description of the accident to ensure that they cannot change it later.

C.) The police officer is going to collect the other party’s contact information and insurance information. People are much less willing to give a police officer fake information. This will ensure that you and the insurance company have a party to pursue for recovery of your damages. If you don’t know who owns the other vehicle, you are going to have a very difficult time recovering your damages.

4.) Contact your insurance company ASAP. If you are driving for a company, call your safety department so they can contact the insurance company for you. This is important because it allows the insurance company to get out to the accident scene right away and collect evidence that is going to protect you and your company. It also ensures that any evidence that would help you is not destroyed. I know some drivers are concerned about reporting accidents to the safety department because they are concerned with losing their job or being punished in some way. That is an ungrounded concern. Safety directors understand that accidents happen. That is why they have the job they do. Their goal is to fix the situation. When they don’t find out about an accident you remove their ability to do their job. There is a much higher probability of being fired if you don’t tell the safety department and they get blindsided by an accident 3 months down the road. Nothing makes a safety director madder than finding out about an accident late when there is no chance to investigate and defend their driver.

5.) Get the contact information for any witnesses to the accident. Witnesses are the most powerful evidence in determining liability. If you have a witness on your side and the other party does not, you are going to recover your damages.

6.) Take pictures of your damages and the other party’s damages. Every truck driver out there on the road should have some sort of camera in their truck. If you don’t, get one. If you are a safety director, set up a program to give your drivers disposable cameras to keep in their trucks. Photos are great evidence.

If you follow these steps, you will put yourself, your company, and your insurance company in a great position to defend you and to pursue your damages against the other party.

Be sure to check back for our next article “What does an insurance company owe you for an accident?”
Clark Schoeder is the President and CEO of Cerberus Subrogation Professionals, LLC. Cerberus Subrogation Professionals, LLC is a subrogation firm that specializes in the commercial trucking sector. They have helped their clients recover millions of dollars in insurance claims and have developed several innovative strategies specifically designed for commercial auto subrogation and arbitration. Those strategies have achieved unparalleled results. Visit their website www.cerberussubro.com to learn more about the Cerberus Advantage.

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