EP 36: How Workers’ Compensation Claims for Catastrophic Events are Different

Welcome to the catastrophic comeback podcast with American Injury Lawyer Clark speaks, helping you find hope, purpose and joy after a catastrophic injury.

So and let me ask you this, doing things outside of work that are inconsistent with your restrictions, how can that impact a workers compensation claim?

You know, more and more insurance companies and defense firms are performing surveillance, okay. And we try to warn people up front that that's a possibility. So that they know that somebody could be just watching them to see what they're doing. And we give our new clients a handout that says, you know, they're watching you basically telling, giving them hints or advice on how they should conduct themselves, not only on social media, but out in the public, right. But what I tell people all the time, is, as long as you're doing what the doctor told you to do, and you're not doing anything that the doctor told you not to do. Then we're okay. Yeah.

So one of the things that I think is, is interesting about catastrophic cases, in particular in a worker's compensation context, is that is kind of the way like, it seems like to me in a smaller case, sometimes though, an employer will sort of end up finding that one thing that's worth noting, I think, is, is never the employer, you could have a great relationship with your employer, employer for 2030 years, the minute you get hurt, somebody else takes over the management of your claim that you have never met before and works for an insurance company. And they don't know you, they don't know how hard you've worked and the sacrifices you've made for this company, and they don't care, that's not their job, their job is to mitigate loss. I think that's something people don't understand. They think they're still working for Joe or Sarah, or, or Alex or whatever that they've worked with for years, and they've taken been there to their house, and they've been to dinner with them and, and all that and spent time with them. And they don't recognize how, how important that is to record to realize that as you're dealing with different different group of people now, right. But one of the things that I think is different about catastrophic cases is that in a catastrophic case, a lot of times the insurance companies will start off, very attentive, very, very dedicated, very much recognizing, okay, there's no way we can get out of this, this was a serious injury, this person was hurt at work, we are on the hook, and we're going to immediately get them good care, get them to a helicopter where they need to go get them to a specialist, get them. And then in a in a, in a less serious context. I don't see them necessarily rushing to do those things. I have my theories, tell me what you think is going on there.

You know, the insurance company has a job to do. And we in this field, we don't like it, right? But their job is to spend as much or as little money as possible, and to get you back to work as fast as they possibly can. Right? So that's why nurse case managers get involved and ask doctors, well, can this person have light duty? What can they do? Can we get them back to work when you're gonna release them from work? So, you know, it's really it's just a toss up on how these folks are, are going to handle our clients case, you know, things are gonna go wrong, you know, you're going to have good adjusters who are going to do everything right, you're gonna have adjusters who are less cooperative, who are not going to do everything as quickly as you want them to

be more aggressive on the part of, of controlling costs and reducing costs and limiting exposure. Well,

that's Yeah, that's true. But what I was leaning towards was, you know, alright, this person was referred to a doctor two weeks ago, and we're still waiting for you to give us an answer. And how much longer is it's going to take because the longer you wait to approve medical treatment, it's really going to cost them more in the long run. Right?

Not to mention our client is in or an injured person is in pain and is is being deprived of medical treatment that they need. With one of the things that I noticed is, is that in these catastrophic cases, they'll start off by being very attentive, and they'll go give them everything that they need. And then gradually later over time, they'll start pulling back and pulling back and pulling back from providing these, these services. Maybe they'll cut from one to attendance in a catastrophic case to one attended. Maybe they'll go from around the clock care to eight hour care, maybe they'll go from, you know, this many medical devices to fewer medical devices, those types of things. And what's going on there? Is it more? Is there more to it than just their, you know, what are they trying to do there? Well, I

mean, listen, somebody falls off a roof and breaks their back. The insurance company knows that they're going to spend hundreds of 1000s, if not millions of dollars on this person, they know they're on the hook, they are they know, they're going to spend a whole bunch of money. And there's not so many ways that they can really cut those costs. So they look to the doctors or they try to scan the doctor's records to say okay, well, maybe he doesn't need 24 hour care, or maybe he can do with one person. It's our job and those cases, and I think that we've been number one, I think we've been fortunate, with our catastrophic cases that we've had really cooperative and empathetic adjusters, right, where they really get it that this was a life changing event. But we have had situations where they tried to cut down care, and where we had to go back to the doctors, and, and use the nurse case managers and use the doctor's notes to say this is why this person still needs this care. And we have been very fortunate, and we've been successful in making sure that our clients have the proper care that they need, regardless of what the insurance companies are trying to

do. You mentioned that in workers in these catastrophic cases, we've been very fortunate to deal with some even on the other side. Attorneys and insurance adjusters, who are who are pros, and there have been in many cases, reasonable, professional, honorable, I think that's an important thing to recognize. And I think that what my question is, is for catastrophic cases, it seems to be a different group, a smaller group, a more specific group of people that work on those types of cases, is that your experience? And if so, tell me about that, and why it is.

Many of the carriers and I don't know if it's all of them. The one, the one example I can give you because they refer to themselves that way is the Hartford has a catastrophic unit. And if you see a certain person's name on a case from them, you know, they're taking it seriously. And you know, they're treating it as a catastrophic case. But most carriers when I worked for a carrier all those years ago, we had all the catastrophic cases, they went up to home office, and they got a lot of attention. And they were handled from there. So I think that a lot of the carriers do have that. And if they don't have a catastrophic division, the adjusters who are working on these types of cases are the more experienced people, they're the folks who have been there for 1015 20 years have been in the industry for maybe even longer than that. They understand the medical portion, they understand what it takes to get the case taken care of. And they have that empathetic attitude towards the injured person.

That to me that that manifests itself with them being them recognizing, okay, this person is seriously injured, and we need to take the steps, even if it costs money, we need to take take the steps to make sure that this person recovers as comprehensively as possible. Is that fair? Yes. Let me ask you that it will if that's the case, what do they need? What do they need us for? Like what do they need an attorney on their side? If if sometimes in these cases, those clients, those those insurance companies, those insurance adjusters are more reasonable are more empathetic, are more understanding and willing to acknowledge the exposure that they face?

You know, it goes back to something is going to go wrong somewhere. Right? And if I've got a family member who's catastrophic, catastrophic ly injured, either in a wheelchair or you know, whatever their situation may be. It's gonna be hard enough caring for that person and taking care of all every day, day to day stuff that goes along with just living and not even adding that, that catastrophic injury to the mix. So Oh, I would want somebody who does this every day, who understands the claims process, and who may have handled type situations just like this in the past, so that I can take care of my family member, help them get better or stable or whatever that's going to be. And let the experts deal with all that other stuff. Because with catastrophic injuries, there are things that happen, that may not happen. In a regular case, if somebody is sitting in a wheelchair, they may develop infections that other people wouldn't. And, you know, that family member who is caring for them or helping to care for them, may not be able to get to the insurance company to get this person back to the doctor. So I think that's where we are a benefit to folks in general, but especially in a catastrophic case.

Also, the one thing that comes to my mind as you're describing that is, I can think of catastrophic cases, off the top of my head where the insurance adjusters I did feel like we're good people and did feel like they were reasonable people, I did feel like they were had a genuine concern for our client and our clients well being. But I also recall, in those same cases, as the case progressed, them starting to pull back services, based on the recommendations of professionals that they had hired, that knew, that knew that their job was to mitigate the damage, mitigate reduce the exposure, they might say, you know, whereas historically, we would provide you with this many of this particular medical device. And now we're going to reduce that, to that half of that, we were surgically going to provide you with round the clock care with two health care workers, we're going to try to reduce that to one or we're going to try to reduce reduce that to one with a in these are kinky, very reputable companies with very, and then we would have to go back and fight to make sure. Or another example would be Think, think about this. If we get when we get to a mediation, and even those cases, they'll start with a low, low, low number. And then it's it requires, you know, advocacy and argument and documentation and evidence, and in legal theories and advocacy, and well, and just effort and hard work and determination in order to negotiate that to a reasonable number. And then I think the other piece of it is, is knowing what is reasonable and what's not reasonable under the circumstances, because you get so many people from the other side of these kinds of cases who might say, well, our policy is to do this. And the advantage is we can have our lawyers go in and go Well, regardless of your policy. This is the law, and this is what you're required to do. And this is what the IC is going to hold you accountable for. Yeah.

But you know, in a mediation, we always expect it to be a battle. I mean, right, there's really, if there wasn't something that was in conflict, we probably wouldn't be there wouldn't have jobs. Right. Right. That's, that's right. And, you know, even in a voluntary mediation, there's going to be some sort of disagreement on the value of the case, right. And it's not a science, it's really, it's, there's an art to it. And it's just a matter of getting trying to get these two people to agree on something or these two sides to agree on something. But you know, in a catastrophic case, we mediated one, you know, that we felt was worth in the seven figure range. And, you know, the defense attorney who has what is a good defense attorney, and takes a hard line with everything started off very low, like, you know, under six figures. But we persevered, we took a really, really long time, we were able to make our client understand the process, so that we ultimately got the result that we were really hoping for. So on so

that's part of it, is that right is to is to, is to understand that this can be a process. And sometimes those cases don't resolve in one mediation or situations. Sometimes there might be three mediations or more in order to try or maybe it resolves after mediation through informal settlement discussions. And I think patience is critical. And I think patience only works when you have a good and solid trusting relationship with the people who provide your representation. Is that fair? Absolutely. What are the things what are the what are the hallmarks of that type of relationship? In other words, what? You've been in this business for a long time, what would you look For if somebody's catastrophically injured, what would you look for in the legal team? And from the legal professionals that you're you would hire? I imagine it would have to be a team in a catastrophic case. Is that fair?

Everybody's gonna have to work on the file. Yeah, from top to bottom.

I mean, these catastrophic cases, I mean, just just pick a recent catastrophic case, in your mind. How many people would work on that file on in a course of the life of that file? Would you say?

Um, probably five or six or more? Yeah,

I mean, if it's a if it's a, you know, if it's one that I'm thinking of, and that's, that might be from the work comp side, from the liability side, it might be another 10, or 12? Yeah. Let me ask you. So back to my original question, or my most recent question, What Would somebody look for in a team that might represent them in a catastrophic case from workers compensation perspective?

Well, you know, people with catastrophic injuries, right, or their families are not the one, they're the ones who are going to hire us, hopefully, or no of us by reputation. Right. They may have seen a commercial, they may have heard a radio commercial. But they're going to go hopefully, with the folks that they have heard really good things about, and whose name stands out to them. Right. And hopefully, give us a chance to get in front of them, to show them what we can do. And I think that we do a good job, especially in these catastrophic cases, because we get the team, whoever that may be working on these cases, right from the very beginning.

So it seems to me that when you describe the the way that insurance companies approach it, they take their most experienced people, the people that have been doing it the longest they take they're given specific attention they have they have a specific group of people that focus on these kinds of cases, the way that they focus on these cases, it seems like it's probably important to have that same experience team, and that same credible team that seem reasonable team that same, you know, from the plaintiff's perspective, would you agree with? Absolutely,

and I think, I think we have that.

Well, let me ask you this. You know, it's, it's a relatively small group of people, do we tend to run into the same? In your opinion, do we tend to run into the same insurance adjusters and firms and lawyers over time and these bigger cases?

Yeah, yeah, we do. Use, you tend to recognize names, and you can develop some sort of relationship with these folks. And same goes for the defense attorneys. I mean, there's, you know, a lot of defense attorneys, but when it comes to a catastrophic case, the folks have been practicing for 30 or 40 years and a handful of people, right, they're the ones who are going to handle those cases, not the guys who are just out of school? And is

it helpful to have relationships and histories with those kinds of people?

Absolutely. And I do my best to establish relationships with the adjusters and with the defense attorneys, because there's going to be something that's going to come up where you're going to have an adversarial relationship. But you know, if you're friends with somebody, you can get through that little adversarial part. And you can move on to the next one, and no hard feelings and you move on. It

seems like it's so it seems like to me that when the in these kinds of situations, if you have pros on both sides, people that do it, people that are that are credible, people that are honorable people that do what they say they're going to do, that we can fight like, you know, there's no tomorrow about a certain issue, and then move on with our lives and continue our professional so long as we've behaved professionally in the process. Is that your observation? Yeah, absolutely. One of the things that I see a lot of times, and maybe you've seen this before is you see, and this came up in our conversation with our in our litigation conversations and, and regular third party liability tort conversations, but you see all these lawyers in these ads and all, you know, we all talk about how we're so aggressive, and we're going to do this and we're going to do that. And, you know, my observation is unwarranted aggression and hostility and a combative attitude can actually be destructive, destructive in this context. How do you feel about that?

I agree. And, you know, there are attorneys on both sides and adjusters who just make things difficult because they can or they want to, and it just hurts the whole process so unnecessary? And I don't, I don't take that approach. You know, I want them to think that I want the insurance companies and the defense attorneys to think that, hey, we're getting the case from Speex law, these guys are straight up. And we know that they're not going to, you know, do anything that's not on the up and up, and they really must have somebody who's hurt. So let's do the right thing. And that just comes from experience.

I think that's right. I think I think that, you know, maybe earlier in my career, I, you know, every single case, I was going to fight somebody, and then now that I've been doing this longer, I feel like I have, I have a much better perspective. And I'm able to, you know, recognize that I'm going to see the same people again, and again and again. And it's going to be important that I have a you know, that I behave professionally and that we conduct ourselves and our team in a professional way. Even sometimes when the other side is not that that's it, we can that doesn't mean that we're weak by the by it doesn't mean that we're going to take something lying down, it just means that we're going to, we're going to be professional, no matter what the circumstances are. And that credibility, again, is the cornerstone of advocacy and buy in by behaving in that way and being professional. And that's the way that we can maximize recovery in our clients case. Chris, thank you so much for being here. I appreciate it very much.

Thank you again for having me. Thank you

Welcome to the catastrophic comeback podcast with American Injury Lawyer Clark speaks, helping you find hope, purpose and joy after a catastrophic injury.

So and let me ask you this, doing things outside of work that are inconsistent with your restrictions, how can that impact a workers compensation claim?

You know, more and more insurance companies and defense firms are performing surveillance, okay. And we try to warn people up front that that's a possibility. So that they know that somebody could be just watching them to see what they're doing. And we give our new clients a handout that says, you know, they're watching you basically telling, giving them hints or advice on how they should conduct themselves, not only on social media, but out in the public, right. But what I tell people all the time, is, as long as you're doing what the doctor told you to do, and you're not doing anything that the doctor told you not to do. Then we're okay. Yeah.

So one of the things that I think is, is interesting about catastrophic cases, in particular in a worker's compensation context, is that is kind of the way like, it seems like to me in a smaller case, sometimes though, an employer will sort of end up finding that one thing that's worth noting, I think, is, is never the employer, you could have a great relationship with your employer, employer for 2030 years, the minute you get hurt, somebody else takes over the management of your claim that you have never met before and works for an insurance company. And they don't know you, they don't know how hard you've worked and the sacrifices you've made for this company, and they don't care, that's not their job, their job is to mitigate loss. I think that's something people don't understand. They think they're still working for Joe or Sarah, or, or Alex or whatever that they've worked with for years, and they've taken been there to their house, and they've been to dinner with them and, and all that and spent time with them. And they don't recognize how, how important that is to record to realize that as you're dealing with different different group of people now, right. But one of the things that I think is different about catastrophic cases is that in a catastrophic case, a lot of times the insurance companies will start off, very attentive, very, very dedicated, very much recognizing, okay, there's no way we can get out of this, this was a serious injury, this person was hurt at work, we are on the hook, and we're going to immediately get them good care, get them to a helicopter where they need to go get them to a specialist, get them. And then in a in a, in a less serious context. I don't see them necessarily rushing to do those things. I have my theories, tell me what you think is going on there.

You know, the insurance company has a job to do. And we in this field, we don't like it, right? But their job is to spend as much or as little money as possible, and to get you back to work as fast as they possibly can. Right? So that's why nurse case managers get involved and ask doctors, well, can this person have light duty? What can they do? Can we get them back to work when you're gonna release them from work? So, you know, it's really it's just a toss up on how these folks are, are going to handle our clients case, you know, things are gonna go wrong, you know, you're going to have good adjusters who are going to do everything right, you're gonna have adjusters who are less cooperative, who are not going to do everything as quickly as you want them to

be more aggressive on the part of, of controlling costs and reducing costs and limiting exposure. Well,

that's Yeah, that's true. But what I was leaning towards was, you know, alright, this person was referred to a doctor two weeks ago, and we're still waiting for you to give us an answer. And how much longer is it's going to take because the longer you wait to approve medical treatment, it's really going to cost them more in the long run. Right?

Not to mention our client is in or an injured person is in pain and is is being deprived of medical treatment that they need. With one of the things that I noticed is, is that in these catastrophic cases, they'll start off by being very attentive, and they'll go give them everything that they need. And then gradually later over time, they'll start pulling back and pulling back and pulling back from providing these, these services. Maybe they'll cut from one to attendance in a catastrophic case to one attended. Maybe they'll go from around the clock care to eight hour care, maybe they'll go from, you know, this many medical devices to fewer medical devices, those types of things. And what's going on there? Is it more? Is there more to it than just their, you know, what are they trying to do there? Well, I

mean, listen, somebody falls off a roof and breaks their back. The insurance company knows that they're going to spend hundreds of 1000s, if not millions of dollars on this person, they know they're on the hook, they are they know, they're going to spend a whole bunch of money. And there's not so many ways that they can really cut those costs. So they look to the doctors or they try to scan the doctor's records to say okay, well, maybe he doesn't need 24 hour care, or maybe he can do with one person. It's our job and those cases, and I think that we've been number one, I think we've been fortunate, with our catastrophic cases that we've had really cooperative and empathetic adjusters, right, where they really get it that this was a life changing event. But we have had situations where they tried to cut down care, and where we had to go back to the doctors, and, and use the nurse case managers and use the doctor's notes to say this is why this person still needs this care. And we have been very fortunate, and we've been successful in making sure that our clients have the proper care that they need, regardless of what the insurance companies are trying to

do. You mentioned that in workers in these catastrophic cases, we've been very fortunate to deal with some even on the other side. Attorneys and insurance adjusters, who are who are pros, and there have been in many cases, reasonable, professional, honorable, I think that's an important thing to recognize. And I think that what my question is, is for catastrophic cases, it seems to be a different group, a smaller group, a more specific group of people that work on those types of cases, is that your experience? And if so, tell me about that, and why it is.

Many of the carriers and I don't know if it's all of them. The one, the one example I can give you because they refer to themselves that way is the Hartford has a catastrophic unit. And if you see a certain person's name on a case from them, you know, they're taking it seriously. And you know, they're treating it as a catastrophic case. But most carriers when I worked for a carrier all those years ago, we had all the catastrophic cases, they went up to home office, and they got a lot of attention. And they were handled from there. So I think that a lot of the carriers do have that. And if they don't have a catastrophic division, the adjusters who are working on these types of cases are the more experienced people, they're the folks who have been there for 1015 20 years have been in the industry for maybe even longer than that. They understand the medical portion, they understand what it takes to get the case taken care of. And they have that empathetic attitude towards the injured person.

That to me that that manifests itself with them being them recognizing, okay, this person is seriously injured, and we need to take the steps, even if it costs money, we need to take take the steps to make sure that this person recovers as comprehensively as possible. Is that fair? Yes. Let me ask you that it will if that's the case, what do they need? What do they need us for? Like what do they need an attorney on their side? If if sometimes in these cases, those clients, those those insurance companies, those insurance adjusters are more reasonable are more empathetic, are more understanding and willing to acknowledge the exposure that they face?

You know, it goes back to something is going to go wrong somewhere. Right? And if I've got a family member who's catastrophic, catastrophic ly injured, either in a wheelchair or you know, whatever their situation may be. It's gonna be hard enough caring for that person and taking care of all every day, day to day stuff that goes along with just living and not even adding that, that catastrophic injury to the mix. So Oh, I would want somebody who does this every day, who understands the claims process, and who may have handled type situations just like this in the past, so that I can take care of my family member, help them get better or stable or whatever that's going to be. And let the experts deal with all that other stuff. Because with catastrophic injuries, there are things that happen, that may not happen. In a regular case, if somebody is sitting in a wheelchair, they may develop infections that other people wouldn't. And, you know, that family member who is caring for them or helping to care for them, may not be able to get to the insurance company to get this person back to the doctor. So I think that's where we are a benefit to folks in general, but especially in a catastrophic case.

Also, the one thing that comes to my mind as you're describing that is, I can think of catastrophic cases, off the top of my head where the insurance adjusters I did feel like we're good people and did feel like they were reasonable people, I did feel like they were had a genuine concern for our client and our clients well being. But I also recall, in those same cases, as the case progressed, them starting to pull back services, based on the recommendations of professionals that they had hired, that knew, that knew that their job was to mitigate the damage, mitigate reduce the exposure, they might say, you know, whereas historically, we would provide you with this many of this particular medical device. And now we're going to reduce that, to that half of that, we were surgically going to provide you with round the clock care with two health care workers, we're going to try to reduce that to one or we're going to try to reduce reduce that to one with a in these are kinky, very reputable companies with very, and then we would have to go back and fight to make sure. Or another example would be Think, think about this. If we get when we get to a mediation, and even those cases, they'll start with a low, low, low number. And then it's it requires, you know, advocacy and argument and documentation and evidence, and in legal theories and advocacy, and well, and just effort and hard work and determination in order to negotiate that to a reasonable number. And then I think the other piece of it is, is knowing what is reasonable and what's not reasonable under the circumstances, because you get so many people from the other side of these kinds of cases who might say, well, our policy is to do this. And the advantage is we can have our lawyers go in and go Well, regardless of your policy. This is the law, and this is what you're required to do. And this is what the IC is going to hold you accountable for. Yeah.

But you know, in a mediation, we always expect it to be a battle. I mean, right, there's really, if there wasn't something that was in conflict, we probably wouldn't be there wouldn't have jobs. Right. Right. That's, that's right. And, you know, even in a voluntary mediation, there's going to be some sort of disagreement on the value of the case, right. And it's not a science, it's really, it's, there's an art to it. And it's just a matter of getting trying to get these two people to agree on something or these two sides to agree on something. But you know, in a catastrophic case, we mediated one, you know, that we felt was worth in the seven figure range. And, you know, the defense attorney who has what is a good defense attorney, and takes a hard line with everything started off very low, like, you know, under six figures. But we persevered, we took a really, really long time, we were able to make our client understand the process, so that we ultimately got the result that we were really hoping for. So on so

that's part of it, is that right is to is to, is to understand that this can be a process. And sometimes those cases don't resolve in one mediation or situations. Sometimes there might be three mediations or more in order to try or maybe it resolves after mediation through informal settlement discussions. And I think patience is critical. And I think patience only works when you have a good and solid trusting relationship with the people who provide your representation. Is that fair? Absolutely. What are the things what are the what are the hallmarks of that type of relationship? In other words, what? You've been in this business for a long time, what would you look For if somebody's catastrophically injured, what would you look for in the legal team? And from the legal professionals that you're you would hire? I imagine it would have to be a team in a catastrophic case. Is that fair?

Everybody's gonna have to work on the file. Yeah, from top to bottom.

I mean, these catastrophic cases, I mean, just just pick a recent catastrophic case, in your mind. How many people would work on that file on in a course of the life of that file? Would you say?

Um, probably five or six or more? Yeah,

I mean, if it's a if it's a, you know, if it's one that I'm thinking of, and that's, that might be from the work comp side, from the liability side, it might be another 10, or 12? Yeah. Let me ask you. So back to my original question, or my most recent question, What Would somebody look for in a team that might represent them in a catastrophic case from workers compensation perspective?

Well, you know, people with catastrophic injuries, right, or their families are not the one, they're the ones who are going to hire us, hopefully, or no of us by reputation. Right. They may have seen a commercial, they may have heard a radio commercial. But they're going to go hopefully, with the folks that they have heard really good things about, and whose name stands out to them. Right. And hopefully, give us a chance to get in front of them, to show them what we can do. And I think that we do a good job, especially in these catastrophic cases, because we get the team, whoever that may be working on these cases, right from the very beginning.

So it seems to me that when you describe the the way that insurance companies approach it, they take their most experienced people, the people that have been doing it the longest they take they're given specific attention they have they have a specific group of people that focus on these kinds of cases, the way that they focus on these cases, it seems like it's probably important to have that same experience team, and that same credible team that seem reasonable team that same, you know, from the plaintiff's perspective, would you agree with? Absolutely,

and I think, I think we have that.

Well, let me ask you this. You know, it's, it's a relatively small group of people, do we tend to run into the same? In your opinion, do we tend to run into the same insurance adjusters and firms and lawyers over time and these bigger cases?

Yeah, yeah, we do. Use, you tend to recognize names, and you can develop some sort of relationship with these folks. And same goes for the defense attorneys. I mean, there's, you know, a lot of defense attorneys, but when it comes to a catastrophic case, the folks have been practicing for 30 or 40 years and a handful of people, right, they're the ones who are going to handle those cases, not the guys who are just out of school? And is

it helpful to have relationships and histories with those kinds of people?

Absolutely. And I do my best to establish relationships with the adjusters and with the defense attorneys, because there's going to be something that's going to come up where you're going to have an adversarial relationship. But you know, if you're friends with somebody, you can get through that little adversarial part. And you can move on to the next one, and no hard feelings and you move on. It

seems like it's so it seems like to me that when the in these kinds of situations, if you have pros on both sides, people that do it, people that are that are credible, people that are honorable people that do what they say they're going to do, that we can fight like, you know, there's no tomorrow about a certain issue, and then move on with our lives and continue our professional so long as we've behaved professionally in the process. Is that your observation? Yeah, absolutely. One of the things that I see a lot of times, and maybe you've seen this before is you see, and this came up in our conversation with our in our litigation conversations and, and regular third party liability tort conversations, but you see all these lawyers in these ads and all, you know, we all talk about how we're so aggressive, and we're going to do this and we're going to do that. And, you know, my observation is unwarranted aggression and hostility and a combative attitude can actually be destructive, destructive in this context. How do you feel about that?

I agree. And, you know, there are attorneys on both sides and adjusters who just make things difficult because they can or they want to, and it just hurts the whole process so unnecessary? And I don't, I don't take that approach. You know, I want them to think that I want the insurance companies and the defense attorneys to think that, hey, we're getting the case from Speex law, these guys are straight up. And we know that they're not going to, you know, do anything that's not on the up and up, and they really must have somebody who's hurt. So let's do the right thing. And that just comes from experience.

I think that's right. I think I think that, you know, maybe earlier in my career, I, you know, every single case, I was going to fight somebody, and then now that I've been doing this longer, I feel like I have, I have a much better perspective. And I'm able to, you know, recognize that I'm going to see the same people again, and again and again. And it's going to be important that I have a you know, that I behave professionally and that we conduct ourselves and our team in a professional way. Even sometimes when the other side is not that that's it, we can that doesn't mean that we're weak by the by it doesn't mean that we're going to take something lying down, it just means that we're going to, we're going to be professional, no matter what the circumstances are. And that credibility, again, is the cornerstone of advocacy and buy in by behaving in that way and being professional. And that's the way that we can maximize recovery in our clients case. Chris, thank you so much for being here. I appreciate it very much.

Thank you again for having me. Thank you