Will my health insurance cover a dog bite? Simple and Effective Tips

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Whose Insurance Pays My Medical Bills After a Dog Bite?

One of the questions we get asked about often is whose insurance pay medical bills after a dog bite. At first impression, this question may seem like it deserves a simple answer, but once you understand how liability insurance works, you will see that the answer isn’t so easy.

First of all, the dog owner’s health insurance won’t cover a dog bite to someone other than the owner because health insurance ensures the covered individual only – in other words, it’s not liability insurance that can be used to cover someone else for the insured person’s negligence or bad acts, or for anything another person’s dog or animal does.

Because of the issues and defenses available to insurance companies and dog owners under Texas law, if you’ve been injured by a dog or other animal, you will probably need to hire an experienced injury attorney to help you with your claim if you expect to make the insurance company compensate you for medical bills, lost time from work, and permanent scarring and/or disfigurement caused by the animal attack. The laws in the state of Texas make it very difficult to get fair compensation without the assistance of an experienced injury attorney.

Most people would think that the obvious answer as to which insurance company pays medical bills is that the dog owner’s insurance should cover the medical care of a dog bite victim – and we agree. However, there are a few things that often times make this impractical, at least at first:

  • Dog bites usually require immediate medical attention, and most animal attack victims don’t know the insurance information of the animal’s owner at the time treatment is needed.
  • The dog’s owner may not have insurance, especially if they are just renting.
  • If the dog’s owner does have homeowners or renters insurance, the insurance company will want to investigate to see if they should pay the claim or not. This does very little to help an injured person with the immediate medical attention they need after a dog bite.
  • Generally, if you’ve been bitten, you’ll need immediate medical care. There isn’t time to make a claim on the dog owners insurance in time to make them pay for your ER bill. Remember, when you’re dealing with an insurance company, they will look for any reason under the sun not to have to pay – that’s how they make $billions per year. They will want to investigate, and will often take their sweet time doing so.

    • 3 Ways Insurance Will Cover Dog Bite Injuries:

  • The Victim’s Own Health Insurance,
  • The Insurance of the Dog’s Owner (usually after a long drawn out claim), or
  • The injured person hires an experienced dog bite lawyer (see No. 2 above).

    • Filing an Insurance Claim After a Dog Bite

    If there is insurance, you’re going to file a claim with the insurance company. Look for the State Farm (or whatever company) customer support number on Google and call it.

    We of course recommend speaking with an experienced Chicago dog bite attorney before you call for many reasons. The most important being that when you call they may ask you for a recorded statement to document what happened in the incident. If you aren’t prepped for this call by an attorney, you may say something that hurts your case later.

    One reason attorneys are eager to get involved in dog bite cases because if there homeowner’s insurance, then it is likely that the policy is a good size. Most policies we’ve seen are $250,000 and bigger.

    Conversely, a renter’s policy could provide as little as $10,000 in coverage.

    Can you sue for a dog bite ? How to file a Dog bite claim ? Does Insurance covers a dog bites? GFM |

    Dog bites often can be painful and expensive. If you’ve been bitten by a dog, your hospital bills may become overwhelming very quickly. The last thing that you want to worry about while you’re recovering is money and medical bills. You probably don’t believe you should have to pay these expenses at all since you were bitten by someone else’s dog. Fortunately, if the dog owner was at fault for the dog bite, there are several ways for you to make sure your medical expenses are covered. Top Kansas City dog bite attorneys discuss below.