Personal Injury Protection (PIP)

     Personal Injury Protection (PIP) is an auto insurance coverage for lost wages, medical bills and other expenses that can result from personal injuries sufferpipclaimsed in a Maryland auto accident. One of the unique things about PIP insurance is that it is not fault based (often called "no fault insurance"). PIP benefit covers the consequences of your personal injuries resulting from an auto accident regardless of who caused the car accident. Maryland’s highest court, the Maryland Court of Appeals, has characterized the purpose of PIP as assuring “financial compensation to victims of motor vehicle accidents without regard to the fault of the named insured.”
     Under Maryland's PIP statute - Maryland Insurance Code Section 19-505(a) - there are seven categories of coverage for PIP: the insured, guests in the insured vehicle, the insured's family members that live in the insured’s household, permissive users, passengers in the car, and injured pedestrians may be covered by the insured vehicle's PIP coverage.
     Maryland accident law does not require PIP coverage on auto policies but insurance companies must offer you PIP coverage when you buy an auto insurance policy. If you do not wish to have PIP, you can reject it in writing by executing a waiver. The mere fact that you were not paying for the insurance does not constitute a waiver of PIP. If the insurance company indicates that PIP was waived, make sure that you or your attorney requests a copy of the waiver.
     PIP insurance is very advantageous when you are injured in a car accident in Maryland because it essentially allows you to recover twice for your medical bills and lost wages. For example, let’s assume that you have $5,000 in medical bills and $5,000 in PIP coverage with GEICO as the result of the negligence of an Allstate driver. Your PIP insurance with GEICO will pay all of your medical bills. Yet you can still collect from Allstate for the same medical bills (and of course for your pain and suffering). This is possible in Maryland under the collateral source rule. It is important to remember that Maryland law (Insurance Code Section 19-508) allows insurers to set a one year "statute of limitations" as the time in which a PIP claim must be brought from the date of the accident. If your Maryland accident lawyer makes a PIP claim on your behalf after the 12-month period, he or she may be ineligible for PIP benefits.
     At Miller & Zois, our attorneys do not charge our clients for making a PIP application. Instead, our lawyers will fill out and process PIP applications for our clients.

Personal Injury Protection (PIP) Applications
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