A sideswipe in the left lane of San Vicente, a rear-end jolt under the 405 at Sunset, or a left-turn tangle at Barrington can look finished once the cars are moved. It is not. The first weeks are when the report number, the policy pages and the medical file either come together or start to drift apart.
At the scene and the same evening
If you can do so safely, get out of the travel lane, turn on hazard lights and check on everyone in both vehicles. Call for help. California expects drivers to remain and exchange information after a wreck with injury or meaningful property damage. Write down names, plate numbers, insurer names and a location that a later reader could actually find, such as “San Vicente west of Bundy, heading toward the ocean,” not only “near Brentwood.” Photograph the final rest of the cars, the signal heads, skid marks, the median or bike lane, and any visible injury, before a tow truck rearranges the scene.
If you went by ambulance to UCLA Ronald Reagan, the VA campus hospital or a Santa Monica emergency desk, ask a family member to keep the discharge papers with the photographs. Those early notes are often clearer than a memory of the same evening weeks later.
The first few days
Request a copy of the crash report once the agency will release it. A wreck on a Westside surface street is often an LAPD report. A wreck on the 405 is often a CHP report, though that is not a rule you should guess from the map alone. The report guide explains how a party of interest requests each kind of document and what the official pages say about fees. Keep the DR number or the CHP report number with the claim numbers that arrive later.
Find the declarations page for every household auto policy. California liability minimums depend on when the policy was issued or renewed, under VEH 16056. For a policy first written or renewed from January 1, 2025 onward, the floor is thirty thousand dollars for one hurt or killed person, sixty thousand for two or more in the same wreck, and fifteen thousand for other people’s property. A policy written before that date that has not come up for renewal may still carry the prior fifteen / thirty / five floor. Uninsured motorist coverage is usually on the same page, unless a named insured declined that coverage in writing. The insurance guide walks through those lines.
Tell your own insurer that the wreck happened, even when you think the other driver caused the wreck. You do not have to sit for a statement on tape with the other driver’s insurer. A short, accurate description of the location and the injuries you already know about is enough at this stage. Guessing about speed or fault in an early phone interview they can keep is how people talk themselves into trouble.
The first two weeks
See a doctor if you have not already, even if the first evening felt only stiff. Westside traffic crashes often produce delayed neck, back or concussion symptoms that are harder to explain if the first medical visit is weeks later. Keep bills, appointment notes and a simple list of days missed from work. If a health plan or a hospital starts sending lien or reimbursement letters, put them in the same folder rather than in a kitchen drawer.
If a city vehicle, a county vehicle or a problem with a city street is in the story, the six-month government-claim clock in GOV 911.2 is already running. That date is much earlier than the two-year lawsuit date. The government-claims guide names the official City of Los Angeles and County desks.
Through the first month
An adjuster may open a file quickly and still take a long time to talk about medical treatment that is not finished. You can share the report and the bills you have. You do not have to accept the first number, and you do not have to sign a release while you are still being treated. A release usually closes every claim from the wreck, including claims you have not yet named.
If the other driver had no insurance, fled, or carried only a thin policy, look again at your own uninsured and underinsured coverage. Unknown-driver coverage has extra statutory hooks, including physical contact and a prompt police report, in INS 11580.2. CIV 3333.4 can also block pain-and-suffering recovery in some uninsured or DUI-conviction situations. The uninsured and Proposition 213 guide covers both problems.
The longer calendar
CCP 335.1 gives two years to start a lawsuit over an injury, or over a death brought about by another person’s wrongful act or neglectful conduct. Talking with an adjuster does not pause that date. A child’s own claim can follow a different clock under CCP 352, but a claim against a public entity does not get that pause. Put the two-year date on a paper calendar and on a phone reminder the same week as the wreck, not the same week as a later stalemate.
California compares fault and reduces a recovery by the injured person’s share, under the rule described in official Judicial Council instruction CACI 405. There is no half-fault cutoff in that instruction. Defendants answer for noneconomic harm only in proportion to their own shares, under CIV 1431.2. The deadline and fault guide explains how those two ideas work together.
When a lawyer is worth a conversation
A modest property-only scrape on a driveway can end with two insurers and a body shop. A wreck with a hospital stay, a child in the car, a truck, a city vehicle or a dispute about who turned left on San Vicente is a different file. If you talk with an attorney, bring the report number, the declarations page, the photographs and the bills. Call the office yourself. Confirm the person’s California license.
- Declarations page
- The short policy page that shows liability limits, UM and UIM figures, any written waiver and any medical-payments coverage.
- Release
- The paper that ends the claim once a settlement payment is made, usually including claims you have not yet named.
- DR number
- The LAPD report number used to request the traffic collision report.