An adjuster calls a few days after the accident. The voice is warm and concerned. The number sounds reasonable, maybe even generous given how overwhelmed you are right now.
That number was calculated with the information available at the time: the bills that had arrived, the treatment on record so far, and whatever the file contained in the first week. If your medical picture is still developing, the offer reflects a claim that has not finished happening yet.
We see the same sequence often enough to describe it: an early number, a file that is still incomplete, and a release that closes both. Whether to accept comes down to what the offer was built from and what it may still be missing. This page covers both, and ends with the five things worth checking before you answer. If you are holding an offer and want it reviewed first, call Adams, Jordan & Herrington, P.C. at 478-743-2159.
How an early evaluation gets built
Some insurers use claims-evaluation software and internal valuation systems when handling bodily injury claims. These tools organize medical records, treatment history, diagnosis and prognosis information, and other file contents into an evaluation range that guides the adjuster. The specific systems, the inputs they weigh, and how much discretion the adjuster retains vary from carrier to carrier and from claim to claim.
What matters for you is less the tool than the timing. Any evaluation, whether generated by software or written by hand, is constrained by what has been documented and what can reasonably be inferred on the day it is made. Early in a claim, that file usually contains emergency treatment records and initial bills. It generally does not yet contain a completed course of treatment, a prognosis from a treating physician, a projection of future care, or an assessment of how the injury affects your ability to earn.
Losses that have not yet been documented may be missing from an early evaluation, estimated only provisionally, or given less weight than losses already supported by records. And a broad settlement release ordinarily ends the claims it covers, so losses that develop later may no longer be recoverable from the released parties.
There is a second thing worth understanding about the adjuster’s position. The adjuster is resolving a file within the parameters their employer sets. That is a legitimate job, and it is a different job from establishing the full documented value of your losses. Those two figures are not automatically the same, and the difference is where much of the disagreement in a claim lives.
What the timing of the offer means
Time works on you, not on the file. The offer arrives at the point where the file is smallest and the pressure on you is beginning to build: bills are arriving, some are heading to collections, savings are running down. Decisions made under that pressure are different from decisions made without it. Nothing about the early number changes as the pressure grows; what changes is how the number feels.
The rest of what an insurer weighs is claim-file mechanics rather than timing: treatment gaps, pre-existing conditions, recorded statements, assigned fault percentages, and publicly available information. Those are covered separately in .
What an early evaluation may not yet capture
| Usually in the file early | What an early evaluation may not yet capture |
|---|---|
| Medical bills incurred to date | Future surgeries, revision procedures, long-term medication |
| Wages missed so far | Reduced earning capacity across a remaining career |
| Treatment completed at the time of the offer | Life care projections: equipment, therapy, attendant care |
| Property damage | Home and vehicle modifications where impairment is permanent |
| An initial assessment of pain and limitation | Noneconomic loss measured against a completed prognosis |
Medical costs beyond the bills you have. Future surgeries, revision procedures, imaging, specialist follow-ups, prescriptions, therapy, pain management, durable equipment. Where impairment is lasting, a life care planner projects these across the remaining lifespan.
Earning capacity, not only lost wages. Wages missed so far are the visible part. If the injury changes what you can do for a living, the gap between your pre-injury trajectory and your post-injury capacity is a separate loss, and converting it into present-dollar terms takes a vocational assessment and an economist.
Costs that never appear on a medical bill. Home and vehicle modifications. Attendant care. Transportation to treatment. Household work you can no longer do yourself.
Noneconomic loss. Pain, mental suffering, and loss of enjoyment of life. There is no formula for these. What supports them is documentation: treatment records, testimony about daily function, and evidence of how the injury changed what a person can do. Where applicable, an injured person’s spouse may also have a separate loss-of-consortium claim, which belongs to the spouse rather than to the injured person.
How all four categories get documented and valued once they exist, including what Georgia’s 2025 tort reform changed about medical-expense evidence, is covered in . What matters here is narrower: whether they were in the file yet on the day the offer was made.
What a contingency fee actually pays for
A low offer creates a second question for many people: whether paying a contingency fee leaves them better or worse off than accepting the number in front of them.
That comparison is not the fee percentage alone. It is the recovery, the fee, the case expenses, any valid reimbursement obligation, and the net, weighed together. What the fee pays for is the work that puts supported figures in front of the carrier instead of estimates: building the medical record, developing the liability evidence, retaining the experts, and preparing the case for litigation if the demand is refused. No firm can promise that representation produces a higher net recovery in a given case; what you can ask is what work will be done, what it will cost, and how the fee and expenses are calculated at the end. That belongs in the written fee agreement before anything begins.
What documenting a full claim involves
The sequence matters more than the calendar. Some of these steps run at the same time, and how long each takes depends on the injury.
Preserve evidence. We send a preservation letter identifying what has to be retained. What belongs on that list, and how quickly each item disappears, is covered in .
Document present losses. Medical records from every provider, employment records establishing pre-injury earnings, photographs of injuries as they develop, and witness statements while recollection is fresh.
Establish prognosis and future needs. Treating physicians address causation and the likely course of recovery. Where the injury involves lasting impairment, a life care planner and a forensic economist translate projected needs into present-dollar figures. Future-needs analysis can materially change the documented damages when an injury produces lasting medical or vocational consequences.
Build the demand. We put the documented losses in front of the carrier with the records that support each category, rather than a figure and an argument.
Negotiate or file. If negotiation does not resolve the claim, litigation may become necessary. We prepare a file for that possibility from the start, because it changes what evidence has to be preserved and developed along the way.
When the at-fault policy may not be enough
An early offer is sometimes low because the at-fault policy is small, not because the claim is. Two additional avenues may matter: uninsured and underinsured motorist coverage on your own policy, which can apply even when the other driver carries some insurance but not enough, and additional liable parties, whose involvement may bring further applicable coverage depending on the relationships and policies involved.
If the offer is the full limit of the at-fault driver’s policy and you carry uninsured or underinsured motorist coverage, the form of the release matters as much as the number. In a motor vehicle case where more than one policy applies, O.C.G.A. § 33-24-41.1 lets you accept the liability carrier’s limits under a limited release that leaves your claim against other coverage intact, and it provides that your own UM policy cannot require the UM carrier’s permission for that settlement. The trade is that the at-fault driver is released from personal liability except to the extent other insurance applies. A general release signed for the same money can close what the statute leaves open, which is why an offer described as the policy limits is the one to have read before signing.
Running the other way, reimbursement rights and liens, including a hospital’s lien under O.C.G.A. § 44-14-470 and Medicare’s own recovery rights where it paid for treatment, can reduce what actually reaches you. Georgia’s rule for health plans is narrower than many people expect: under O.C.G.A. § 33-24-56.1 a benefit provider may seek reimbursement only where the injured person has been fully compensated, and the claim is cut by a pro rata share of attorney fees. That rule does not reach every plan. How coverage stacks and what a plan can claim are covered in .
Before you respond to an offer
Five questions decide whether an offer is worth accepting, and all five can be answered before you respond.
1. Is the medical picture finished? If a treating physician has not addressed prognosis, or treatment is still changing, the file does not yet contain what the claim is worth.
2. Are the losses that have not happened yet documented? Future care, reduced earning capacity, and the costs that never appear on a medical bill have to be supported before they can carry weight. An evaluation may not fully account for a future loss that has not yet been documented or reasonably established.
3. Is the fault assumption in the number correct? If part of why the offer is low is a percentage assigned to you, covers how that figure gets built and what moves it.
4. What does the release close? A settlement release can extinguish known and unknown claims within its scope, but in Georgia it discharges the persons or entities it names or otherwise clearly identifies, not everyone who might be responsible. Read exactly who is being released and which claims the language reaches, not just the dollar amount, and whether it makes you responsible for paying any liens out of the settlement. If the offer is a policy limit and you have UM coverage, ask whether the release is the limited form described above.
5. Is anything running out? Filing deadlines run whether or not negotiations are active, and a government entity in the case can shorten them sharply. Those periods are covered in .
If the adjuster has also asked you for a recorded statement, that is a separate decision with its own rules, covered in .
Frequently asked questions
Should I accept the first offer if liability is clear? Clear liability does not mean the offer accounts for the full extent of the injury. Compare it against your documented and reasonably anticipated losses rather than against the bills received so far. Early offers can arrive before a prognosis is complete.
Can I still recover if I have a pre-existing condition? Yes. Georgia law recognizes recovery when a pre-existing condition is aggravated or worsened by negligence. What matters for an early offer is whether the file yet contains the medical documentation separating your pre-injury baseline from your post-accident condition. Without it, an early evaluation has very little to work with on this point.
What if the insurer says I was partly at fault? The assigned percentage is contestable with evidence: the police report, witness accounts, physical evidence, and where liability is disputed, accident reconstruction.
An early offer reflects the claim as it existed in the file on the day it was made. Whether to accept it depends on whether that file is finished. The way to find out is to have the record built first: treatment and prognosis established, earning capacity assessed, and the losses that never appear on a medical bill accounted for.
Adams, Jordan & Herrington, P.C. represents injured people and their families across Macon, Warner Robins, Milledgeville, Albany, and Middle Georgia. We work on a contingency fee basis and advance case costs, so having an offer reviewed does not add a bill to the ones you already have. are listed separately. Call 478-743-2159 for a free consultation.
This article is for general informational purposes and does not constitute legal advice. Reading it does not create an attorney-client relationship. Every case depends on its own facts. Past results do not guarantee similar outcomes. Georgia law changes through legislation and court decisions. For advice about your situation, consult a licensed Georgia attorney.