Frequently asked questions
Forty-five questions people ask Paul R. Shalhoub on the phone, answered the way he answers them, with the Florida statute behind each legal point so you can read it yourself.
Three Florida rules change more answers on this page than anything else, and it is worth having them before you start.
Fourteen days. Your own PIP benefits pay only if you get initial medical care within 14 days of the crash. Section 627.736(1)(a) is written that way, and nothing undoes a missed window.
Two years. Section 95.11(5)(a) gives two years for an action founded on negligence, down from four before March 2023. Pages published before then still say four, including some that are still online.
Fifty-one percent. Under section 768.81(3)(a) a person found more than 50 percent at fault recovers nothing. Below that, the award is reduced by the percentage.
Answered by Paul R. Shalhoub, Florida Bar #88300, who handles every case himself.
Starting a claim
What does it cost to talk to Paul Shalhoub?
Nothing, and there is no version of the call that produces a bill. Consultations are free and confidential. We advance case costs, and you owe no attorney’s fees or reimbursement of those costs unless we recover compensation for you.
Do I have a case?
Usually answerable on the first call, because it turns on four things: whether someone owed you a duty of care, whether they fell short of it, whether that is what caused your injury, and whether there is insurance or an asset that can actually pay. Paul will tell you which of those is missing when one is, including when the answer is that you do not have a claim worth bringing. That answer is free too, and it is better than a year of a file going nowhere.
How soon should I call after an accident?
Early, and the reason is not the filing deadline — that is two years away. It is that the evidence is not. Store and parking-lot video is commonly overwritten inside two to four weeks. A vehicle is repaired or sold for salvage. A commercial truck’s electronic data is overwritten by continued driving. Skid marks and a missing stop sign do not survive a month. The deadline is generous; the proof is not.
Will I speak to the attorney or to a case manager?
To Paul. The Florida Bar’s own record for Bar #88300 lists the firm size as one. There is no intake department to be routed through and no case manager standing between you and the person making decisions about your claim, because there is nobody else to be.
Do I have to come to the office in West Palm Beach?
No. Paul does home and hospital visits, and a first conversation happens by phone most of the time. The office is at 1011 N Olive Ave if you would rather come in, about a mile north of the Palm Beach County Courthouse.
What should I bring or have ready for the first call?
Whatever you already have, and do not delay the call to assemble it. The useful items are the crash report or its case number, photographs, the name of every insurer involved including your own, your own auto policy declarations page, the names of anyone who has treated you, and anything you have already signed or recorded. If you have none of that, call anyway — most of it can be obtained for you.
What if I already gave the insurance company a statement?
It is not fatal and it is common. A recorded statement is a fixed account of an injury you did not yet understand, which is exactly why adjusters take them early, but it is one piece of evidence among many and it can be explained. What matters is that there are no more of them until someone has read the first one.
What if I already signed something?
Call before anything else happens, and bring the document. A medical authorization is one thing; a general release is another, because a release ends the claim for injuries that have not been diagnosed yet, not only the ones on the bill so far. The two are not always obvious apart on paper.
What if I already have a lawyer?
You are entitled to a second opinion and to change counsel, and asking for one is not a breach of anything. What you should know is that where a case changes hands, the first firm generally asserts a claim for its fees and costs out of any eventual recovery — that is resolved between the lawyers, not added on top of your share. Paul will tell you plainly whether your case needs moving or only a phone call to the firm you have.
Deadlines
How long do I have to file an injury claim in Florida?
Two years for most negligence claims. Section 95.11(5)(a) covers “an action founded on negligence”, and the period was shortened from four years to two for incidents on or after 24 March 2023. If you read four years somewhere, you read something written before that change.
Is a wrongful death claim also two years?
Yes, under section 95.11(5)(e) — but it runs from the date of death, not from the date of the incident. Those are different dates when someone survives a crash for weeks or months. There is one circumstance with no deadline at all: under section 95.11(11), where the death resulted from an act described in Florida’s murder or manslaughter statutes, the civil action may be commenced at any time.
Does medical malpractice have a different deadline?
It has its own, and it is more complicated. Section 95.11(5)(c) gives two years from the incident or from the time it was discovered or should have been discovered, but “in no event shall the action be commenced later than 4 years from the date of the incident”. That outer four-year bar does not apply to an action brought on behalf of a minor on or before the child’s eighth birthday. Where fraud or concealment prevented discovery, the period extends two years from discovery, to a maximum of seven.
What if a city, a county or the state is involved?
Then the deadline that ends these claims is not the two years. Section 768.28 requires written notice on the agency and on the Department of Financial Services first, and then a six-month wait before suit. Miss the notice and the limitations period never becomes relevant. A county bus, a municipal road crew, a sheriff’s vehicle and a public hospital all land here.
What if the injured person is a child?
Different rules reach in at different points, and they do not all run the same way. The medical malpractice repose period has its own exception for a claim brought before a child’s eighth birthday. Settlements for a minor can require court approval rather than a parent’s signature once the net amount passes a statutory threshold. Do not assume a child’s claim simply waits until they turn 18.
Is a nursing home claim on the same clock?
The limitations period is not the first obstacle. Chapter 400 imposes its own presuit requirement: section 400.0233(2) sets a 75-day presuit notice period before a negligence action against a nursing home can be filed. Chapter 766 does the same for medical negligence, with a verified expert opinion and 90 days in which “a suit may not be filed”. Both of those have to happen inside the limitations period, not after it.
Insurance and medical bills
What is PIP and why does the 14 days matter so much?
PIP is the no-fault coverage on your own Florida auto policy, and it pays first regardless of who caused the crash. Section 627.736(1)(a) conditions it on receiving initial services and care within 14 days of the crash. Not treatment within 14 days of noticing pain — within 14 days of the crash. A person who waits three weeks to see whether a sore neck resolves can lose the benefit entirely.
Does PIP really only pay $10,000?
Up to $10,000, and the part people miss is that it is a shared limit under section 627.736(1): medical benefits and disability benefits come out of the same pool. A serious injury consumes the medical side quickly, and the wage portion is gone before it is ever paid. There is also the emergency medical condition distinction, which can cap the medical benefit at $2,500 where no qualified provider has made that determination.
Who pays my medical bills while the claim is open?
In order: PIP first, then your health insurance, then any MedPay on your auto policy, then whatever arrangement a provider will accept pending the claim. The at-fault driver’s insurer pays nothing until the claim resolves — that is one payment at the end, not a running account. Anyone telling you the other driver’s insurance will “cover the bills as they come” has described something that does not happen.
What if I have no health insurance?
PIP still applies if a Florida auto policy covers you, and it does not ask about health insurance. Beyond PIP, providers who handle injury patients will often treat under an arrangement that waits for the claim. The practical consequence is on the other end: what was advanced has to be resolved out of the recovery, which is one of the things that gets negotiated before you are paid.
What happens to the liens and the bills at the end?
They are resolved out of the settlement before your share is calculated, and how hard that can be fought differs by the kind of lien. A Medicaid lien has a statutory procedure: section 409.910(17)(b) allows a claimant to contest the agency’s share only by petition to the Division of Administrative Hearings within 21 days, on clear and convincing evidence, and the statute calls that the exclusive method. Twenty-one days is short enough to be missed by a person who does not know it exists.
What if the other driver had no insurance?
Then the claim usually runs on your own uninsured motorist coverage, if you have it. Two provisions decide how that goes. Under section 627.727(6)(a) you must give written notice by certified or registered mail to every UM carrier before settling with the at-fault driver’s insurer, and it then has 30 days. Under subsection (6)(c) the UM credit is the at-fault policy’s limits even if you settled for less — so accepting $18,000 of a $25,000 policy gives away $7,000 of your own coverage.
Can I find out the other driver’s policy limits?
Yes, and most people never learn this. Section 627.4137(1) requires a liability insurer, within 30 days of a written request, to disclose under oath the name of the insurer, the name of each insured, the limits of the liability coverage, any coverage defense it reasonably believes is available, and a copy of the policy — “including excess or umbrella insurance”. Until you have that, you cannot know whether an offer is near the ceiling or nowhere close.
Do I have to give the other insurer a recorded statement?
No. You have obligations to your own insurer under your policy; you have none to the other driver’s carrier, and a recorded statement to it is a voluntary act. The questions are pleasant and they are not neutral — “how are you feeling today?” produces “better” from most people, and “better” gets quoted back a year later.
Why does a motorcycle rider have no PIP?
Because of a definition. Section 627.732(3) defines a “motor vehicle” for these purposes as a self-propelled vehicle “with four or more wheels”. A motorcycle is outside it, so Florida’s no-fault scheme does not apply and there is no $10,000 cushion before the liability claim starts. It also means the permanent injury threshold does not stand between a rider and a claim for pain and suffering.
Fault
What if I was partly at fault?
You can still recover, up to a point. Section 768.81(3)(a) bars recovery entirely for a claimant found more than 50 percent responsible. At or below that, the award is reduced by your percentage: 20 percent at fault on a $100,000 case means $80,000. The percentage is not announced by the insurer — it is argued, and it is the number worth arguing about.
Their insurance says I caused the accident. Does the crash report decide it?
No, and this is the most useful thing on this page for anyone in that position. Section 316.066(4) provides that the crash report, and the statements of the person making it, “may not be used as evidence in any trial, civil or criminal”. An officer who arrived after it was over and wrote down one driver’s version has not decided anything. Fault is decided on evidence that is admissible: the vehicles, the scene, the physics, independent witnesses, video.
I was rear-ended. Is that automatic?
Nearly, but not quite. Florida applies a presumption of negligence against the rear driver, and the Supreme Court of Florida has described what happens when the rear driver offers a substantial and reasonable explanation: the presumption is reduced to a permissible inference the jury may or may not draw. In practice that means the rear-end case is strong and still has to be built — and the fight in most of them is not fault at all, it is the injury.
What if I had a pre-existing condition?
A pre-existing condition is not a defense to the harm a crash did to it, and the statute anticipates the argument. Section 627.737(2) opens the door where the injury consists “in whole or in part” of a qualifying permanent injury. Those four words carry the point: your claim is the change, not the baseline. What this does mean is that the prior records matter, because the difference has to be visible.
What if I fell in a store and they say they did not know about the spill?
That is the whole question in a Florida fall case. Section 768.0755 requires a person who slipped on a transitory foreign substance in a business establishment to prove the business had actual or constructive knowledge of it. Constructive knowledge is proved circumstantially — that the condition existed long enough that it should have been discovered, or that it occurred regularly and was foreseeable. That is an evidence problem with known answers: inspection logs, sweep sheets, the state of the substance, the video.
A dog bit me. Does the owner have to have known it was dangerous?
No. Section 767.04 makes the owner liable for a bite in a public place or where the bitten person was lawfully on private property, “regardless of the former viciousness of the dog or the owners’ knowledge of such viciousness”. Two limits sit in the same section: the bitten person’s own negligence reduces liability by their percentage, and a prominently displayed, easily readable sign including the words “Bad Dog” can relieve the owner — except as to a child under six, or where the owner’s own negligence caused the injury.
I was attacked at an apartment complex. Is the owner responsible?
Sometimes, and since 2023 Florida has told residential owners exactly how to avoid it. Section 768.0706 gives a multifamily owner a presumption against liability for a third party’s criminal act if it has substantially implemented a specific list — lighting of at least 1.8 foot-candles at 18 inches above each parking-lot surface, security cameras at entries and exits retaining footage for at least 30 days, specified locks, a peephole, lighted walkways and so on, plus a crime prevention assessment and staff training. The list is also a checklist for the other direction, and under subsection (3) the burden of proving it is the owner’s.
Money
What does the firm charge?
A contingency fee, which is a percentage of what is recovered and nothing if there is no recovery. Consultations are free and confidential. We advance case costs, and you owe no attorney’s fees or reimbursement of those costs unless we recover compensation for you. The percentage and everything it covers is in writing before you sign anything.
Who pays the case costs if we lose?
The firm. Case costs are a separate thing from the fee — filing fees, records, deposition transcripts, expert time, which in a litigated case run into real money. Paul advances them, and if there is no recovery you are not billed for them and not asked to repay them. The distinction matters because a promise about the fee alone says nothing about the costs, and some firms advance them and then bill them back out of what you are paid.
What is my case worth?
Nobody can tell you honestly until three things are known: what the injury turned out to be after treatment finished, what the fault picture looks like on admissible evidence, and what coverage exists to pay. An early number is a guess dressed as an answer, and the guess is nearly always low because the person making it does not yet know about the surgery. Anyone who gives you a figure on the first call is selling something.
Should I accept the first settlement offer?
Not until you know the policy limits, whether you are finished treating, and what the paper in front of you gives up. The offer is not the problem; the release is. A general release ends the claim for injuries that have not been diagnosed yet, and there is no provision for coming back when the shoulder needs surgery in March.
Can I claim lost wages if I am self-employed?
Yes, and it is provable — it is just proved differently. Not a letter from an employer, but returns and 1099s establishing the baseline, invoices month by month showing what the months after the injury looked like, declined or canceled work in writing, and the arithmetic that connects the two. The claim is for lost profit rather than gross receipts, which is a distinction worth getting right before an adjuster gets it wrong.
How long does an injury case take?
It depends on one thing more than any other: when your treatment reaches a point where a doctor can say what you are left with. A claim cannot be valued before that, so a case that settles in four months and a case that takes two years often differ by the injury rather than by anything a lawyer did. Filing suit adds a litigation schedule on top, which is sometimes the faster route anyway.
Will I have to go to court?
Most injury claims resolve without a trial. That said, what a claim is worth is affected by whether the carrier believes the file will be tried if it is not paid, which is why Paul litigates and tries cases rather than treating trial as a thing that never happens. If your case does go, you will know well in advance and you will be prepared for it.
Working with Paul Shalhoub
Who actually handles my case?
Paul. He opens it, he deals with the adjuster, he takes the depositions and he tries it if it needs trying. The Florida Bar record for Bar #88300 lists firm size one, which is the verifiable version of that claim rather than a line in an advertisement.
Why does it matter that he used to defend insurance companies?
Because a claim is evaluated by an adjuster working inside a system with rules, and Paul spent the first part of his career inside it. He knows how reserves are set, which decisions an adjuster can actually make and which go up a level, and what a file has to contain before a number moves. The practical consequence is in how a claim is built: toward the thing the other side needs in order to pay, not toward a letter that sounds angry.
How often will I hear from the office?
At every point where something happens, and whenever you call and ask. The complaint clients make about large firms is not usually about the result — it is about going five weeks without knowing whether anything happened. Call the number on this page and you are speaking to the attorney.
Can Paul come to me?
Yes. Home and hospital visits across Palm Beach County, and they are routine rather than a favor. If you cannot drive, or you are in a bed at Good Samaritan or St. Mary’s, that is not a reason to postpone getting advice.
How do I check that an attorney is licensed and has no discipline history?
Look it up yourself in about a minute. The Florida Bar publishes a profile for every licensed member showing admission date, county and circuit, law school, federal court admissions, firm size and a ten-year discipline history. Paul’s is Bar #88300, admitted 22 March 2011, no discipline in ten years. Do the same for anyone else you are considering.
Does the firm handle anything other than injury cases?
No. Personal injury only. No workers’ compensation, no criminal defense, no family law, no property-damage-only claims. A family law firm with the Shalhoub name shares the same building — it is Paul’s father’s practice and a different firm. If what you need is one of those, Paul will tell you where to go.
Does reading this page make me a client?
No. Nothing on this site creates an attorney-client relationship and nothing you read here is confidential. A relationship begins only when the firm agrees in writing to represent you. The answers above describe Florida law in general and cannot know the facts of your situation, which is what the free consultation is for.
Talk to Paul, not a case manager
If your question is not here, it is the one worth asking on the phone. Paul R. Shalhoub answers it himself. Consultations are free and confidential. We advance case costs, and you owe no attorney’s fees or reimbursement of those costs unless we recover compensation for you.
Call (561) 208-5058 Free case review
Shalhoub Law Injury & Accident, 1011 N Olive Ave, West Palm Beach, FL 33401. This describes Florida law as of 27 October 2026 and applies to claims in Florida. It is general information, not legal advice, and reading it does not create an attorney-client relationship. Past results do not guarantee or predict a similar outcome.