What to Do When Your Lawyer Closes Your Accident File

Attorney Answer

Closing a file is your lawyer's decision about representing you. It is not a decision about your claim — and the deadline to bring that claim keeps running whether anyone is working on it or not. That deadline is the urgent part.

Lawyers close accident files for a range of reasons, and most of them say nothing about whether the claim is any good. Some are about economics: the likely recovery does not support the cost of pursuing it. Some are about proof — a fault problem, a gap in treatment, a medical record that does not connect the injury to the crash. Some are about the relationship: a disagreement about settling, a client the firm could not reach, a conflict with another client. And some are about the lawyer, not the case, including a practice that has changed direction. A closing letter normally states the reason, and you are entitled to ask for one in writing if you did not get it.

Two things are true at the same time. First, another lawyer may look at the same file and take it. Firms weigh cases differently, and a case that is too small for one practice is a normal case for another. Second, a rejection by a firm that knows the file is information worth taking seriously, especially if more than one firm says the same thing.

The part that cannot wait is the calendar. Nothing about closing a file pauses a limitations period. Florida's deadlines for injury claims are in Fla. Stat. § 95.11, and for an accident before March 24, 2023 a negligence claim ran on the former four-year period, which the Legislature shortened to two years in 2023 for later accidents. If a government body or employee is involved, there is a separate requirement: Fla. Stat. § 768.28(6)(a) makes written presuit notice to the agency, within three years of accrual and within two years for a wrongful-death claim, a condition of bringing the case at all. Those are conditions you can miss without ever seeing a courtroom.

What you can do

1. Ask the firm in writing for a complete copy of your file and for the closing letter. Your file is yours, and firms are used to this request.

2. Ask them, in the same letter, for the accident date they had on record, whether anything was ever filed, and whether any deadline has already passed. Their answer tells the next lawyer what they need to know first.

3. Take that file to another Florida attorney now rather than after you have thought it over. Days matter here, and a new firm needs time to evaluate it before any deadline.

4. Keep treating if you are still symptomatic, and keep your medical records and bills together.

5. Ask a lawyer about any lien or fee claim the former firm may assert against a future recovery, and about anything the closing letter says you must do.

6. Most lawyers offer a brief initial call at no cost, and a few minutes on your specific facts with someone who practices in Florida is worth more than any general guidance, including this page.

⏱ Time limits apply. The deadline for a claim arising from a crash comes from Fla. Stat. § 95.11 and is keyed to the accident date: for an accident before March 24, 2023 the former four-year period applied, and the Legislature shortened it to two years in 2023 for later accidents. Which version reaches an older crash is a lawyer's question, not a page's. A government defendant adds the separate presuit notice condition in § 768.28(6)(a). Do not calculate any date yourself — with the file closed, have a Florida attorney read the actual dates in it this week.