Lowering of a profession

• fan_from_texas

  Fab4Runner;1064154 wrote:Lol I love that you say lawyers suck. The few I know (as well as a few law students) are all good people. That said, I've never had to deal with one regarding a business matter, etc.

  Eh, most lawyers I know are pompous, anal-retentive a-holes who aren't good at math and don't have good social skills. Most are alcoholics, too, and plenty are depressed. Similar to government bureaucrats, the amount of esteem in which they hold themselves tends to be inversely proportional to their actual importance and positive impact on this world, resulting in a strangely Vonnegutian situation where the less attention you should have to pay to what they're saying, the more attention they demand.
  
  My advice is not to sue or be sued or get divorced. Ever.
• Little Danny

  

  fan_from_texas;1064167 wrote:Eh, most lawyers I know are pompous, anal-retentive a-holes who aren't good at math and don't have good social skills. Most are alcoholics, too, and plenty are depressed. Similar to government bureaucrats, the amount of esteem in which they hold themselves tends to be inversely proportional to their actual importance and positive impact on this world, resulting in a strangely Vonnegutian situation where the less attention you should have to pay to what they're saying, the more attention they demand.
  
  My advice is not to sue or be sued or get divorced. Ever.

  QFT.
• Fab4Runner

  

  fan_from_texas;1064167 wrote:Eh, most lawyers I know are pompous, anal-retentive a-holes who aren't good at math and don't have good social skills. Most are alcoholics, too, and plenty are depressed. Similar to government bureaucrats, the amount of esteem in which they hold themselves tends to be inversely proportional to their actual importance and positive impact on this world, resulting in a strangely Vonnegutian situation where the less attention you should have to pay to what they're saying, the more attention they demand.
  
  My advice is not to sue or be sued or get divorced. Ever.

  Dammit...I really planned on divorcing wildcats after a few years.
• jmog

  fan_from_texas;1064167 wrote:Eh, most lawyers I know are pompous, anal-retentive a-holes who aren't good at math and don't have good social skills. Most are alcoholics, too, and plenty are depressed. Similar to government bureaucrats, the amount of esteem in which they hold themselves tends to be inversely proportional to their actual importance and positive impact on this world, resulting in a strangely Vonnegutian situation where the less attention you should have to pay to what they're saying, the more attention they demand.
  
  My advice is not to sue or be sued or get divorced. Ever.

  The best part of this post is that FFT is a lawyer .
• Sonofanump

  Little Danny;1064086 wrote:Who do you think trained the insurance executives to conduct business as they do?
  
  http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/06_18/b3982072.htm

  A book written by a plantiff attorney. Wonder what side he will be on.
• Sonofanump

  fan_from_texas;1064107 wrote:That's fascinating. When dealing with USAA, it seemed to me that they were being "reasonably unreasonable"--e.g., skimming about $500 off my claim, which is presumably a sum that's too small to fight over. They were really a bunch of jerks about the whole thing, even though I was pretty fair and reasonable.

  How do you know that they we not paying you the full amount and $500 less? Should there not be documents to show the value and if they are paying you less they must have a valid reason or end up with a department of insurance claim.
• Sonofanump

  Also, why do you think Nationwide obtained 2,000,000 new customers each year. To make up for the 2,000,000 they lost due to poor service. If you see them advertise on TV, stay away.
• tcarrier32

  

  jmog;1064202 wrote:The best part of this post is that FFT is a lawyer .

  i kept asking myself, isn't this guy a lawyer? props for honesty I suppose.
• fan_from_texas

  Sonofanump;1064209 wrote:How do you know that they we not paying you the full amount and $500 less? Should there not be documents to show the value and if they are paying you less they must have a valid reason or end up with a department of insurance claim.

  They outsource their valuations to a 3rd party, which keeps a national database of dealer "take" prices, and then they calculate value based on that. They explicitly don't consider retail value or replacement value, so their number tends to come out lower. I sent about 20 e-mails and had a bunch of phone calls with them where we went over options, which they flatly refused to include. They would do things like determine post hoc that the windows were in "good" condition (as opposed to "very good"), which is ludicrous, because after the accident, the windows were shattered all over the interior of the car.
  
  In other words, they come up with a system that is facially supportable but clearly biased, but no one in their right mind is going to spend thousands of dollars to hire an attorney and spend a year in court to gain $500. They have been hit with numerous multi-million dollar class action lawsuits, but I assume they view that as a cost of business and still come out ahead.
  
  I haven't received my settlement check yet. As long as that is still pending, I don't want to comment too much, but if this thread is still active when I receive it (presumably sometime this week), I'll check back in.
• Belly35

  

  The guy had Safe Auto .... I called once and was give a claim number, instruction of what was going to happen, what to do (estimate of damage) and so far no problems. I called today told them I have a repair appointment next week and need the situation handled. They said that this should not be a problem... keep the appointment and I gave them the repair name, location and phone number and faxed over the estimate repair cost of the damage...
  
  MO will be back in shape .. I enjoy riding her..:laugh:
• Sonofanump

  fan_from_texas;1064215 wrote:They outsource their valuations to a 3rd party, which keeps a national database of dealer "take" prices, and then they calculate value based on that. They explicitly don't consider retail value or replacement value, so their number tends to come out lower. I sent about 20 e-mails and had a bunch of phone calls with them where we went over options, which they flatly refused to include. They would do things like determine post hoc that the windows were in "good" condition (as opposed to "very good"), which is ludicrous, because after the accident, the windows were shattered all over the interior of the car.
  
  In other words, they come up with a system that is facially supportable but clearly biased, but no one in their right mind is going to spend thousands of dollars to hire an attorney and spend a year in court to gain $500. They have been hit with numerous multi-million dollar class action lawsuits, but I assume they view that as a cost of business and still come out ahead.
  
  I haven't received my settlement check yet. As long as that is still pending, I don't want to comment too much, but if this thread is still active when I receive it (presumably sometime this week), I'll check back in.

  Gotcha, does not seem like that would be acceptable to the DOI. Not exactly sure about Illinois, but they owe market value which is higher than trade in and lower than retail since retail would imply inspection, maintenance and warranty.</SPAN>
• Little Danny

  

  Belly35;1064227 wrote:The guy had Safe Auto .... I called once and was give a claim number, instruction of what was going to happen, what to do (estimate of damage) and so far no problems. I called today told them I have a repair appointment next week and need the situation handled. They said that this should not be a problem... keep the appointment and I gave them the repair name, location and phone number and faxed over the estimate repair cost of the damage...
  
  MO will be back in shape .. I enjoy riding her..:laugh:

  Hopefully the damage to your car and rental bill does not exceed $7500. If the person had Safe Auto that is the limit of her liability coverage (in Ohio).
• Scarlet_Buckeye

  

  Wait until you need a lawyer, you won't say that then.
• I Wear Pants

  Douchebag attorneys were douchebags before they were attorneys.
  
  The three or so attorneys that I actually know are cool as shit.
• Cat Food Flambe'

  

  Some areas of specialization can be sleazy - when we lost our daughter, we got at least a dozen contacts from malpractice lawyers (No, we didn't sue - the doctors didn't do anything wrong).
  
  On the other hand - I used a legal partnership in the Polaris area over eight years to handle affairs when my sister and BIL were killed in an auto accident. They advised me not to sue (can't get blood from even a guilty turnip), assisted with the probate actions, (I had to technically sue the parent's estates on their son's behalf - no will, and they died at the same time) and oversaw my handling of custody and guardianship of my nephew. After eight years, about a dozen court appearances, etc, it was time to settle up the bill.
  
  They charged me $2700.00 - I had expected ten times that. Reason - "We figure the young man will need the money a lot more that we will - we just billed the direct costs".
  
  They're not all evil.
• Bigdogg

  fan_from_texas;1064167 wrote:Eh, most lawyers I know are pompous, anal-retentive a-holes who aren't good at math and don't have good social skills. Most are alcoholics, too, and plenty are depressed. Similar to government bureaucrats, the amount of esteem in which they hold themselves tends to be inversely proportional to their actual importance and positive impact on this world, resulting in a strangely Vonnegutian situation where the less attention you should have to pay to what they're saying, the more attention they demand.
  
  My advice is not to sue or be sued or get divorced. Ever.

  ^+1