Uninsured or Underinsured Motorist Coverage, or UM for short, is optional insurance that is part of your auto insurance. This insurance will reimburse you or a family member if you or they are in an auto accident with either an uninsured driver, a hit-and-run driver, or in some cases where the other driver has inadequate insurance to pay for your total loss. UM insurance is essentially insurance against the other driver not having enough insurance. It is you protecting yourself. Up until last week, Georgia had what was known as the Reduction Rule The Reduction Rule made it so you only received the difference between your UM insurance and the other driver’s liability insurance. For example, if the other driver had $25,000 in liability insurance (the Georgia minimum) and you had $75,000 in UM insurance, you were only allowed to get $50,000 of your UM insurance ($75,000 – $25,000), not the entire $75,000. Even worse, if the other driver had $100,000 insurance and you only had $25,000 of UM insurance, you were not entitled to any of your UM insurance because it is less than the other driver’s insurance.

The Georgia Senate voted on March 6th to pass the House’s legislation to amend Georgia’s UM statute (O.C.G.A. § 33-77-11). The amendment abolished the Reduction Rule, thereby giving Georgia consumers
full access to their UM coverage regardless of the other driver’s policy amounts. Governor Purdue signed the bill last week despite tremendous pressure from the insurance industry. The change in the law puts Georgia with a growing trend of 23 other states, including our neighbors Alabama and Florida that ensure their citizens receive the full benefit of insurance they have been paying for all along. The change in the law becomes effective on January 1, 2009.

For more information on how insurance affects your Atlanta auto accident case, please visit www.BraunsLaw.com, where you can learn about your case in more detail.