Short answer
A $10,000 policy against a serious injury makes the driver underinsured, and Florida law treats an underinsured driver as uninsured to the extent your damages exceed his limits. Your own underinsured motorist (UIM) coverage pays the difference, up to your UM limits, after your carrier receives a credit for the $10,000. The order of operations matters: before you accept the driver’s limits, your UM carrier must receive written notice by certified mail, and it then has 30 days to consent to the settlement or to pay you the $10,000 itself and pursue the driver in your place.
Answered by Kweku Darfoor, Esq., founder of The Injury Advocates, a Plantation-based personal injury law firm serving Fort Lauderdale, Broward County, and South Florida. General information, not legal advice about your situation.
Section 627.727(3) defines an uninsured motor vehicle to include an insured vehicle whose liability insurer “has provided limits of bodily injury liability for its insured which are less than the total damages sustained” by the injured person. Florida UM coverage is excess, meaning it sits on top of the at-fault driver’s coverage rather than replacing it. If your damages are $250,000, the driver carries $10,000, and you have $100,000 of UM on each of two vehicles with stacked coverage, the recovery is $10,000 from the driver’s insurer and up to $200,000 from your own.
This is the step that most often goes wrong when people handle underinsured claims on their own. Before accepting the at-fault driver’s policy limits, you must give your UM carrier written notice of the proposed settlement by certified or registered mail. The carrier then has 30 days to choose:
Either way the carrier receives a credit for the driver’s limits. What you cannot do is sign the liability insurer’s release first; that can destroy the carrier’s subrogation rights and with them your UIM claim. We send the notice in every underinsured case and calendar the 30 days.
A $10,000 bodily injury carrier facing a surgery or a hospital admission usually tenders its limits early, sometimes within weeks, because leaving its insured exposed to an excess judgment creates bad-faith risk. A fast limits offer is a sign that the claim is worth far more than $10,000. It is also the moment the certified-mail notice to your UM carrier must go out, and the moment your UM carrier begins evaluating the claim as if it were the defendant.
The UIM claim is proved like a negligence case: fault, causation, and damages. Economic damages (medical bills beyond PIP, lost income, future care) are recoverable without a threshold; pain and suffering requires a permanent injury under section 627.737(2). Your carrier may require a recorded statement, an examination under oath, and an independent medical examination, and it may contest fault even though the other driver’s insurer already paid. We prepare the claim for that fight from the start: treating physician opinions on permanency, wage records, and a life-care plan when the injury is catastrophic.
Related: Florida uninsured motorist lawyer · stacked vs. non-stacked · when your own insurer lowballs the claim
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Yes, if you follow the procedure: written notice to your UM carrier by certified mail before you settle, and either the carrier’s consent within 30 days or its payment of the offer in exchange for keeping its rights against the driver. Settling first and telling the carrier later can forfeit the UIM claim.
Yes. The carrier receives a credit for the at-fault driver’s bodily injury limits. If your damages are $250,000 and the driver paid $10,000, the UIM claim is for the remaining $240,000, up to your UM limits.
Florida UM is excess over the driver’s limits, so the two combine: $10,000 from the driver’s insurer plus up to $10,000 from your UM carrier, more if your coverage is stacked across vehicles or household policies.
