If you have taken a vehicle insurance on your car loan it is the best move you could make as a borrower of a loan. However, you need to ensure that you keep pace with the developments happening in the insurance and the finance so that you can make wise decisions with the situation in hand.
The Insurance Regulatory Development Authority (Irda) has come up with a study that, the victims in a road accident have been deprived timely justice, as they get their settlement from their insurance company after waiting for about 5 years.
The delay, as they explain, is due to the complex and lengthy procedures, involving the process of victims filing their claims, that needs to be routed through the judicial system which involves different parties. And after all the wait, only 85% of these insurance claims are actually settled.
Most cases end up as tribunals because ambulance chasing lawyers reach the accident victim before the insurance company can and encourage them to go for litigation promising better compensation, as said by insurers.
The reason for the delay is because, currently, there are about 3 crore cases pending in different courts across India and third party related cases can be ranging from 10-12 lakh. Since district courts are handling these cases now, earlier what was done through specific tribunals, the speed of of settlements of such third party claims is slow.
The time frame for filing third party claims are not definite. Even after 3 years of the accident, you can file a claim since in some cases, the victim learns about the right to file a case after a couple of years of the accident.
The Irda study claimed that the time for a death claim under private car portfolio can range from 9-36 months and under the two wheelers’ portfolio, range from 6-42 months.
The entire process from the time of intimating the courts and receiving claims involves complex processes like exchange of documents between all parties involved, summon of witnesses, proof of income and certificates for disability. Each case takes at least three-four hearings to complete and the gap between each hearing is generally about a month.