Maryland Injury Law Center

Dear USAA:

You have some of the best, most sophisticated adjusters of any car insurance company out there. Generally speaking, you make more reasonable settlement offers than the other companies with big car insurance market share in Maryland (better than GEICO, State Farm or Allstate). Sure, you force us to try some cases against you to pay our clients a fair settlement value. And, yes, you would probably shoot your own parents in the head to save a buck. But, really, in the insurance company world of relativity, you are not that bad.

Now that I have finished the flattery, could you do me one small favor? Teach your insurance adjusters in personal injury cases that there is something called the collateral source rule in Maryland. You simply cannot deny a lost wage claim because you “suspect the client was being paid anyway.”

At first, I thought it was just one bodily injury adjuster at USAA who did not understand Maryland law. But I’m now convinced that less than half of USAA adjusters understand this rule.

Even more maddening, when the adjuster is called out on this obvious point of law that Maryland has had for – count them – 112 years, that the claimant is paid for time missed from work regardless of whether they used vacation time or their employer paid them out of the goodness of their heart, USAA adjusters simply refuse to admit or deny the existence of the collateral source rule.

Thank you in advance for your anticipated cooperation.

Sincerely,
Ron Miller

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Update: this case was still going on in 2018 which is insane.  I don’t like State Farm as much as the next plaintiffs’ lawyer. But I understand State Farm’s larger point on this issue, which I explain below.

In State Farm v. Cavoto, a Pennsylvania appellate court decided a battle between two parties who are always at odds, State Farm and chiropractors. Usually, the skirmishes between these parties are fought by proxy but, in this case, they faced off directly.

Who Can Provide Treatment?

Essentially, State Farm got fed up with paying chiropractors who were billing for adjunctive procedures performed by support staff who were not licensed. Particularly, and arguably understandably, annoying to State Farm was unlicensed people applying hot and cold packs, turning on and off mechanical devices, using a traction machine, and assisting in therapeutic exercises. I’m sure that most infuriating to State Farm is paying for someone without medical training to apply hot and cold packs. If you can’t see why the insurer takes exception to that -regardless of how you view the merits of it – you may have had one drink too many from the plaintiffs’ attorney Kool-Aid.

The appellate court didn’t look at the case quite that way. Instead, the court applied the law that appears to allow unlicensed staff members to provide some treatment. The court reasoned that the real medical care was the decision to give the hot or cold packs and for how long, not who applied them. Similarly, the court reasoned, most elements of applying electrical muscle stimulation, ultrasound, and the like do not require specialized skills, as long as there is a chiropractor deciding the details and how the therapy should be applied. The court remanded the case back to the trial court to “make more specialized findings and determine whether any of the procedures allegedly performed by unlicensed personnel required formal chiropractic education or training, including a further inquiry by the court as to the scope of those procedures.”

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