Need the legal advice ...

[Forrest]

I was asked to tow a car trailer outa state & bring back an H1. Sounds like fun.



Couple day trip ... but I didn't commit yet. What came to mind was the legal protection. I don't have any insurance for that kind of thing.



It's the "what if" that concerns. A tire blows & the H1 gets wrecked, totaled. Something gets ripped off it while parked ... on & on.



Am I correct in assuming I'm wide open for a law suit?





Forrest

 

[JDougherty]

my understanding of my car insurance policy is as follows



as long as it is hooked to my truck it is insured by my truck insurance. i would think that would cover you towing home your hummer with a borrowed trailer. my guess is that would not cover you towing home a stangers hummer for money

 

[JDougherty]

called my agent

i was just talking to my insurance agent... a business partner... and she said the trucks liability coverage will cover the trailer when they are hitched up. the cargo itself should have its own insurance i. e. car insurance or cargo insurance. she said as long as this a personal trip then i would be ok...





it was good for me to know as well as i am always hauling other peoples boats, they don't want to have a loud stinky truck :-laf

 

[Forrest]

Thanks. I called my insurance company this morning ... interesting stuff.



The trailer is covered by my insurance, even though it's not my trailer. It's hooked directly to the truck, therefore it's covered. The Hummer is not covered by my policy however. The words are "I have no insurable interest" in the Hummer. Makes sense.



As long as the owner has coverage for the Hummer & it's contents, all is well. The deal on being sued is they need to prove negligence. Accidents do happen though.



All this S wouldn't bother me if it was a borrowed trailer & my vehicle on there. Assuming the H1 is fully covered, like replacement value, then all should be well.

 

[RustyJC]

Forrest,



Not to muddy the waters, but if I were in your shoes, I would want the owner of the Hummer to insist that his insurance carrier provide him with a waiver of subrogation. Without this, his insurance carrier may pay to fix the Hummer, but then the insurance company could turn around and sue you to recover their losses. If they have waived their right of subrogation, that eliminates that risk.



JM2CW... .



Rusty

 

[Forrest]

Rusty ... i'd call that bit of advice worth a lot more than $. 02 You must have been flamed, TDR style, before. :-laf



Outstanding ... done, i'll persue that. Oo.

 

[stevegeorge]

WAIVER OF SUBROGATION !!!! DON'T LEAVE HOME WITHOUT IT!!! (experience talking here)

 

[JDougherty]

good idea ... .



a little off topic but what about a directory with in tdr that would list personal expertise other then diesels... ... ? in this case there may be somebody that is an insurance agent or an attorney in our group that we could have just called.

 

[Turbo Tim 1]

A friend of mine bought one of those convert-a-balls, he owns a Ford too so it's not a big surprise. The type he bought had a screw asembly on the top not a pin through the side. Anyways he went ice fishing one weekend and on the way home he hit a huge frost heave in the road and guess what? The ball came apart and his trailer and 2 snowmobiles and dog sled took flight, the tow chains snapped and the trailer started doing cartwheels. Everything was totaled, he gets home and calls insurance... . nope, nothing was covered, at least in Maine you have to have seperate insurance on a trailer. Of course I never said anything like "I Told You So" about the convert-a-ball. Anyhow we ended up finding out the balls were being recalled but wally world still had them on the shelf where he bought them, in the end Wal-Marts insurance paid for everything and he made out extremely well since one of the sleds had finally died on the trip and almost got burnt in the camp fire on the lake before he went home. The moral of the story is to make sure what you particular insurance will cover!

 

[merryman]

Advice from a Lawyer;

ONLY a person up to date on the law in your state---including but not limited to that applicable to negligence, bailment(bailment has to do with the law/rules applicable when one is in possession of something belonging to someone else), and Insurance law as well as the insurance policy(s) in question could give you reliable advice. Anything else is a crapshoot. That said the subrogation advice is good, and only the insurance carrier for the vehicle in question can give that waiver.

Each state has its own rules, and the legislatures are prone to change those rules regularly; the insurance companies write the policies, under statutory limits and rules, and they change those now and then.



Vaughn