Auto Insurance: Medical-Payments Coverage

If you have coverage for medical payments on your car policy, you and your family members are entitled to reimbursement of medical costs resulting from auto accidents while in your car or someone else's car, or if you're injured by a car while walking or bicycling, regardless of who is at fault.

Your guests qualify if they are injured in your car. Medical-payments coverage is typically $1,000 to $10,000 for each person protected by your policy. It would cost you relatively little to raise the coverage to a higher amount.

The company will reimburse a wide range of expenses, from eyeglasses to funeral costs, subject to varying conditions. One policy may pay medical expenses only for the first year after an accident, another for the first three years afterward, and still another up to five years, provided you buy more than a stipulated amount of protection.

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Payments may be reduced by any amount that you receive or are entitled to receive from other parts of the policy or from other sources. In certain situations the company may pay only expenses that exceed the compensation obtainable from other insurance.

Before you consider additional medical coverage, check to see if it would duplicate coverage you already have under other medical policies, especially comprehensive, high-limit health insurance.