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Limiting Bad-Faith Exposure

The predictability of calculating general damage values in personal injury claims can be highly speculative.

By Steven Plitt | Updated on May 29, 2008

The predictability of calculating general damage values in personal injury claims can be highly speculative. By its nature, pain and suffering is a subjective experience. It is difficult for an individual to measure his own pain, let alone the pain of another. In the case of Voland v. Farmers Insurance Co. of Arizona (1997), the court observed that the calculation of general damages is “no more precise or predictable than throwing darts at a board.”

Traditionally, insurance companies use a “round-table” process to evaluate personal injury claims. Round-tabling is a process in which an insurance company’s most skilled casualty claim professionals come together to evaluate injury claims by examining settlements in similar claims, jury verdicts, and the like. Recently, insurance companies have turned to an electronic round-table approach created by Colossus, a software program designed to help claim professionals determine, with some consistency, the value of any given personal injury case. The process also can smooth out variations in claim payouts among similar claims.

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