This post is from Attorney Edward A. (“Ted”) Bills who can be reached at 719.444.1000 or at http://www.SpringsAttorney.com.

When you suffer a personal injury, you may be entitled to compensation for your injuries. Legal responsibility, called “liability,” revolves around the fact that most injuries happen because someone was careless or “negligent.” Even if you were partly responsible for your own injury, it is still possible to get some compensation if someone else was also careless and partly responsible for your injury.

Common injuries in personal injury cases include head injuries, brain injuries, spinal cord injuries, burn injuries, broken bones, fractures, knee injuries, neck injuries, back injuries, shoulder injuries, muscle and ligament injuries, herniated or bulging disks, reflex sympathetic dystrophy (RSD), complex regional pain syndrome (CRPS), paralysis, paraplegia, and quadriplegia. Personal injury law areas of practice generally include motor vehicle accidents, auto accidents, motorcycle crashes, semi-truck collisions, 18-wheeler wrecks, SUV rollover accidents, drunk driving accidents, slip, trip and fall injuries, premises liability claims, construction site accidents, job-related accidents, industrial accidents, dangerous and defective products, as well as dog bites and animal attacks.

When you’re injured, you need all the help you can get, and you need it as soon as possible. Still, it’s important to pick an attorney who will care more about your well-being than in getting a quick, but low, settlement – someone that will understand that it is not just you who has issues, but your spouse, your children, and other family members.

Many personal injury lawyers provide initial consultations free of charge. Through such a process you can interview the lawyer before making a decision. What is important is how comfortable you are with the lawyer you select. Care should be taken, however, to make your selection in a relatively short period of time since the law provides strict limits and specific time period in which suit may be brought. Once engaged, an attorney should be responsive to your needs; answer questions satisfactorily, return telephone calls promptly, have an experienced administrative staff and, most importantly, represent your interests zealously. If at any time you are dissatisfied with your lawyer, you should be able to change attorneys without penalty.

While most personal injury claims are settled out of court, knowing that an attorney is both willing and able to try a case in court, if that becomes necessary, should add an additional dimension to your overall sense of security. Then if the case does fail to settle, strong and shrewd litigation skills can almost certainly precipitate a better outcome.

So what does it cost?

Most personal injury lawyers work on a contingent-fee basis, which means that you pay nothing unless the attorney wins the case or secures a settlement acceptable to you. Typical contingent fees range from thirty to forty percent of the amount of damages recovered. While it may be tempting to choose a lawyer based solely on who will take the lowest percentage, fees alone should not be the determining factor since it is often the most experienced lawyer that will ask for, deserve and earn, the higher fees.

All legal cases have associated costs and such costs need to be paid. In personal injury cases, costs are generally paid first from the settlement funds, but it there is no settlement, costs are paid by the client. Costs include such items as filing fees, expert testimony fees, deposition fees, arbitration fees, legal research fees, postage, administrative and other related costs.