Why the Other Driver Can Still Claim Against You in No-Fault Florida

Attorney Answer

Florida's no-fault rule is narrower than most people think. It sends each driver to their own policy for the first layer of medical bills and lost income, and it limits when the other driver can sue you for pain and suffering. It does not stop a claim for what their PIP did not pay, and it does not stop a claim for a permanent injury.

Fla. Stat. § 627.736(1) requires every qualifying policy to provide personal injury protection, up to $10,000 in medical and disability benefits, to the named insured, resident relatives, people operating or riding in the insured car, and pedestrians the car strikes. Subsection (1)(a) provides for "Eighty percent of all reasonable expenses for medically necessary medical, surgical, X-ray, dental, and rehabilitative services, including prosthetic devices and medically necessary ambulance, hospital, and nursing services if the individual receives initial services and care pursuant to subparagraph 1. within 14 days after the motor vehicle accident." Subsection (1)(b) covers sixty percent of lost gross income and lost earning capacity from an inability to work caused by the injury. Your own insurer pays those benefits regardless of who caused the crash.

PIP pays 80 percent of medical bills and 60 percent of lost income, and it stops at $10,000. Everything it does not cover, the other 20 percent, the other 40 percent, and anything above the cap, is an economic loss the other driver can claim from the person who caused the crash. So can damage to their car. Florida's no-fault statute gates only one category of damages: pain and suffering.

That gate is Fla. Stat. § 627.737(2). In a tort action against the owner, operator or occupant of a vehicle that carried the required security, the statute provides that "a plaintiff may recover damages in tort for pain, suffering, mental anguish, and inconvenience because of bodily injury, sickness, or disease arising out of the ownership, maintenance, operation, or use of such motor vehicle only in the event that the injury or disease consists in whole or in part of: (a) Significant and permanent loss of an important bodily function. (b) Permanent injury within a reasonable degree of medical probability, other than scarring or disfigurement. (c) Significant and permanent scarring or disfigurement. (d) Death." A soft-tissue injury can meet that threshold or fail it; the question is whether a physician will say the injury is permanent within a reasonable degree of medical probability. That is a medical dispute.

On fault, a date matters. Your crash happened before March 24, 2023, and for accidents before that date § 768.81(2) provided: "In a negligence action, contributory fault chargeable to the claimant diminishes proportionately the amount awarded as economic and noneconomic damages for an injury attributable to the claimant's contributory fault, but does not bar recovery." A 2023 law changed both that rule and the filing deadline for accidents on or after that date. Which regime governs a particular claim is a question for a lawyer, not this page.

The practical point is that this claim is your insurer's to handle. If you carry bodily-injury liability coverage, your insurer defends the claim and pays what is owed within the policy limits. Most private drivers are not required to carry it: Fla. Stat. § 324.022(1) requires only $10,000 in property-damage liability. If you have no bodily-injury coverage, the other driver's claim for economic losses and, if the threshold is met, pain and suffering runs against you personally.

What you can do

1. Report the claim to your own insurer in writing now, and send it anything you receive from the other driver or their lawyer.

2. Pull your declarations page and confirm whether you carry bodily-injury liability coverage and in what amount.

3. Keep what exists: the crash report, photographs, and the information exchanged at the scene. Do not create a new written account of the crash for anyone but your own lawyer or insurer.

4. Do not discuss the other driver's injuries with them, and do not offer to pay anything.

5. Ask a local attorney what the other driver's claim can reach and how the comparative-fault rules for a crash of your date apply. Most lawyers offer a brief initial call at no cost, and a few minutes on your specific facts, and on how claims like this run in your county, is worth more than any general guidance, including this page.

⏱ Time limits apply. For a crash before March 24, 2023, the period for a negligence action was four years under the former version of Fla. Stat. § 95.11; a 2023 law shortened it to two years for later accidents. Whether the other driver's claim is timely, and which period governs, depends on the crash date and facts this page does not have. Have a Florida attorney review the dates.