After being involved in a car accident, the last thing you worry about is filing a claim with your car insurance provider. We first worry about ourselves and anybody else who was involved in the accident. Then, we focus on dealing with the police, waiting for a tow truck, and the other concerns that come along with being involved in an accident. This is why it is important to know that depending on the state, the insured could have anywhere from 1-10 years to file a claim with their insurance company. The average being 2-3 years. 

Even though the time to file a claim for an accident is dependent on each state, most insurance companies will tell you to file the claim immediately after the accident or within the first 24 hours. But, this is not stated in your policy to file a claim immediately because there is a liability time limit in each state. This is called the “statute of limitations.” Every state has their own statute of limitations that have different time limits for various accidents and damages, such as property, collision, and comprehensive damage or bodily injury. For example:

  • New Jersey’s statute of limitations for property, collision, and comprehensive damage is 6 years and bodily injury is 2 years.
  • Pennsylvania’s statute of limitations for property, collision, and comprehensive damage is 2 years and bodily injury is 2 years.
  • Michigan’s statute of limitations for property, collision, and comprehensive damage is 3 years and bodily injury is 3 years.

The reason why there is a longer period of time to file a claim for an accident is because some injuries or mechanical car problems can’t be seen for a few weeks, months, or even, years.

Even though having this much time to file a claim is nice, it might be difficult to defend the claim after some time has passed. Insurance companies become skeptical of delayed claims and will investigate if the damage was from the claim filed or from a later accident. Unfortunately, if the insurance company finds the filed claim to be untrue, they will deny the claim and not cover the costs.