As I noted in a short post from a couple of days ago, it is important that you protect yourself and your family as much as you protect third-parties. In other words, if you injured someone else and have liability limits which exceed your uninsured or under-insured motorist limits, then you are protecting everyone else more than yourself and your own family or other persons riding in your vehicle. This simply does not make any sense.
Surprisingly, when your uninsured motorist limits are increased to match your liability limits the expense is much lower than what you would anticipate. Certainly, all of this depends on the coverage’s that you have, but the numbers are surprisingly minimal. Your insurance agent or broker can give you quotes for such an increase, but literally doubling your uninsured motorist coverage and under-insured motorist coverage might only be a few more dollars a month, and won’t you feel much better knowing that there is better coverage for you or the members of your family when riding in your car.
Further and perhaps more importantly, uninsured motorist coverage or under-insured motorist coverage can cover you or your family members in somewhat unusual situations. I represented a young man who was riding his skateboard on the sidewalk and was hit by a motorist that was quickly turning into his apartment complex driveway so as to avoid opposing traffic and simply ignored looking out for pedestrians using the sidewalk. The driver only had minimum limits and the young man on the skateboard had more serious injuries involving a fracture. With the uninsured motorist and under-insured motorist coverage that his family had on their vehicles, an under-insured motorist claim was made against his family’s insurance carrier for the additional value of his injury and for which he was eventually compensated.
This insurance, uninsured and under-insured motorist coverage, will cover you and your family members as long as a motor vehicle is involved in the injuries. Not that your children should be playing out in the street, if an accident occurred these coverages would afford you some modicum of protection should one of your children be injured by a vehicle.
Further, if you were struck by a motor vehicle while riding a bicycle, your uninsured and under-insured motorist coverage would afford you protection for such a loss. I have a number of friends who road bike for exercise and uninsured motorist coverage is truly critical for this activity.
Please feel free to contact my office should you have any questions involving this type of insurance coverage.