When I first started practicing twenty-three years ago, it was a challenge to handle cases for tourists from outside of our time zone. But today, with all of the different communication methods available, communication is easy.
Email makes things particularly easy. With email, messages can be sent without cost, and virtually instantaneously. Emails can be responded-to any time – day or night. With the advent of Skype, Google Hangouts, and even newer apps, we can now communicate with foreign clients virtually face-to-face, for little or no cost.
Document exchange with tourists is also very easy. We can scan and email documents to any email address around the world – almost instantaneously.
The Benefits Of Working With A Personal Injury Attorney For Tourists Injured In Florida
Probably the most important benefit to working with a Florida lawyer is that we are very familiar with the laws here – and most tourists are not. If I was on vacation in Spain and I got hurt, first of all, the language would be a barrier for me. Secondly, I have no idea what the laws are in Spain or how the legal system works there.
Another benefit to working with a Central Florida lawyer is that we live here and we work against the regular tourist-related defendants (theme parks, resorts, rental car companies, etc.) all the time. We know many of the representatives and decision-makers with these organizations. We also know the lawyers that defend them.
Do Foreigners Have The Same Rights In A Personal Injury Claim As US Citizens?
Tourists (foreigners) have the same rights to be free from someone else’s negligence as any Floridian. Just because a person is here on vacation from a different state, or has a different passport, does not matter at all in terms of asserting a personal injury claim for money damages.
Different Laws For Foreigners In A Personal Injury Claim
Laws for travelers injured here in Florida are no different. There are differences in the way that the cases are evaluated. One such difference is the cost that the other side knows they can impose upon a traveler when they can force the traveler to come back to Florida to litigate a lawsuit.
Another difference is medical expenses. In most personal injury cases in Florida, and everywhere else in United States, the foundation of the case value of a personal injury case is typically medical bills. That is one of the first elements of damages that we present to the other side. Once we know the medical expenses, we can craft arguments about pain and suffering and other collateral types of damages.
We find that when we deal with people from foreign countries, typically they do not have any medical expenses because most of the civilized world outside of the U.S. has socialized medicine. This constitutes a big difference, compared to Florida, and often impacts overall case value.
For more information on Communicating With An Attorney, a free initial consultation is your next best step. Get the information and legal answers you are seeking by calling 407-644-4444 today.
