Michigan pays personal injury protection benefits through the injured person’s own policy, which works until there is no policy to look to. That situation is more common in Detroit than the design of the no-fault act assumes, and the statute answers it with a separate route that has its own form, its own administrator, and its own deadline.

The route is the assigned claims plan, run by the Michigan Automobile Insurance Placement Facility. MCL 500.3172(1) opens it to a person injured in a motor vehicle accident in this state where no personal protection insurance applies to the injury, where none applicable can be identified, where none can be ascertained because insurers are disputing coverage between themselves, or where the only identifiable coverage is inadequate because an insurer cannot meet its obligations.

The Four Doors Into the Plan

Those four conditions are broader than the phrase “uninsured driver” suggests. The first covers the case people picture, where nobody involved carried PIP. The second covers a hit and run, or a vehicle whose coverage cannot be traced.

The third is the one most often missed. Where two or more automobile insurers are arguing about which of them owes coverage, or about how the loss should be split, the injured person does not have to wait out that dispute. The statute treats an unascertainable insurer the same as an absent one, and benefits can be claimed through the plan while the carriers sort themselves out.

The fourth reaches insurer insolvency, where a policy exists on paper but cannot deliver benefits up to the prescribed maximum. Our Michigan No-Fault Insurance Guide covers how the coverage levels chosen after the 2019 reform interact with each of these situations.

One Year to Notify, and It Is a Different Year

MCL 500.3174 requires a person claiming through the plan to notify the Michigan Automobile Insurance Placement Facility within one year after the date of the accident. On an initial determination of eligibility, the facility promptly assigns the claim and tells the claimant which insurer it went to.

That one-year notice runs against the facility, not against an insurer, and it is easy to lose while someone is still trying to work out whose policy applies. Time spent waiting for two carriers to resolve a coverage dispute is time running against this deadline, which is exactly why the third door exists.

The statute then routes the lawsuit back to the ordinary rule. An action by a claimant must be commenced as provided in MCL 500.3145, so the limitations analysis that governs any other PIP claim governs this one once the claim is assigned.

What the Application Requires

A claimant files a completed application on a claim form provided by the facility and supplies reasonable proof of loss. The facility, or the insurer assigned to administer the claim on its behalf, must then specify in writing what materials constitute reasonable proof of loss, within 60 days after receiving a compliant application.

That written specification is worth insisting on. It converts an open-ended request for documents into a defined list, and it starts from the date a complete application was received rather than from whenever the file is picked up.

One limit is written into the same section. The facility or the assigned insurer is not required to pay interest for any period during which the claim is reasonably in dispute, so delay here is not penalized the way it is elsewhere in the act.

What This Does Not Replace

The assigned claims plan supplies personal injury protection benefits. It does not supply a claim against the driver who caused the crash, and the two proceed separately on separate timetables.

A claim for noneconomic loss against the at-fault driver still requires death, serious impairment of body function, or permanent serious disfigurement under MCL 500.3135(1), and still runs on the three-year period in MCL 600.5805(2) rather than on either of the one-year rules above. Detroit crashes are litigated in the Wayne County Circuit Court, and our Michigan personal injury attorneys handle those claims alongside the benefits side.

The mini tort is where the interaction turns cruel. A claim for up to $3,000 in vehicle damage from the at-fault driver is available under MCL 500.3135(3)(e), but subsection (4)(e) provides that damages must not be assessed where the damaged vehicle was being operated without the security the act requires. An uninsured driver can reach PIP benefits through the assigned claims plan and still recover nothing for the car.

The plan also has a recovery mechanism of its own. Unpaid benefits due or coming due may be collected under it, and the insurer to which a claim is assigned is entitled to reimbursement from the defaulting insurers to the extent of their financial responsibility. A claimant does not have to fund that dispute or wait for it to finish.

The facility deadline is the one that runs quietly, because nothing arrives in the mail to mark it. It is worth calendaring the day of the crash. One call is usually enough for us to tell you where things stand. Call us at (800) 525-6386.

If Nobody’s Policy Seems to Apply

An injured person with no obvious insurer is not without a claim, and the assumption that they are is what causes the one-year notice to pass unnoticed. We handle no-fault claims at Neumann Law Group in Detroit and across Michigan, including claims routed through the assigned claims plan. We are glad to talk through any of these questions. Call (800) 525-6386 or send us a message and we will get back to you.

One collision can produce claims that expire in different years, and the periods are set by different statutes that do not cross-reference each other. A single crash can leave one claim live and another already gone, which is why a general answer about how long someone has is usually the wrong answer.

The default for injury to a person or property is three years, under MCL 600.5805(2). Three other periods displace it depending on what is being claimed and from whom, and each has its own trigger.

Three Years for the Claim Against the At-Fault Party

MCL 600.5805(2) sets three years after the time of the death or injury for all actions to recover damages for the death of a person or for injury to a person or property. That is the period for a tort claim against whoever caused the harm, and it is the number most people have heard.

It is also the period for a mini tort claim for vehicle damage, which is a tort claim against the at-fault driver rather than an insurance benefit. Product liability actions run on three years as well, under subsection (12), with a proof consequence attached where a product has been in use for at least 10 years.

The trigger is the injury, not the discovery of it, and not the point at which treatment finishes. Our Michigan personal injury attorneys work from that date backward in every intake.

One detail in the opening subsection is worth noting. MCL 600.5805(1) measures the period from when the claim first accrued to the plaintiff, or to someone through whom the plaintiff claims, so a claim inherited or derived from another person does not restart on the date it changed hands.

One Year for No-Fault Benefits

Personal injury protection benefits do not run on the three-year period at all. MCL 500.3145 bars an action for PIP benefits more than one year after the accident unless written notice of injury was given to the insurer within that year, or the insurer already paid benefits for the injury.

Where notice was given or a payment made, the action may be brought within one year after the most recent allowable expense, work loss, or survivor’s loss was incurred. A separate limit in the same subsection caps recovery to losses incurred within one year before the action was commenced, so a timely claim can still lose older bills.

Applying the three-year figure to a benefits claim is the most common way a Michigan no-fault case is lost, and it happens because both claims arise from the same crash and nothing about the crash signals that two clocks started.

Two Years for Malpractice, With a Six-Year Outer Wall

A claim charging malpractice runs on two years under MCL 600.5805(8). The accrual rule is stricter than most people expect, because MCL 600.5838a(1) provides that a medical malpractice claim accrues at the act or omission regardless of when the plaintiff discovers it.

A discovery route exists alongside it. An action may be brought within the applicable period or within six months after the plaintiff discovers or should have discovered the claim, whichever is later, with the burden of proving non-discovery resting on the plaintiff. A six-year repose closes the outside edge except in narrow circumstances, including where discovery was prevented by fraudulent conduct.

The notice of intent required before filing interacts with all of this and does not extend it. Tolling under MCL 600.5856(c) is capped at the days remaining in the notice period, so the clock pauses rather than resetting.

The Deadlines That Run Against Someone Other Than a Defendant

Two more periods run against parties who are not the person being sued, which is what makes them easy to miss. A person claiming through the assigned claims plan must notify the Michigan Automobile Insurance Placement Facility within one year after the accident under MCL 500.3174, and a refusal of a chemical test after a traffic stop carries a 14-day window to request a hearing under MCL 257.625f.

Neither is a lawsuit deadline. Both terminate a right if they pass, and neither generates the kind of paperwork that reminds anyone they exist. The refusal window in particular starts from the date of a notice rather than from any court date, which is what makes it easy to lose while a criminal case is still being scheduled.

A wrongful death claim adds another layer. The action itself runs on the three-year period, but MCL 600.2922 imposes separate deadlines on family members who may share in the proceeds, including a duty to advise the personal representative’s attorney within 60 days of service and a requirement to present a claim by the date set for the distribution hearing. Our page on Michigan wrongful death claims covers who may bring the action.

Nothing on this list is extended by an insurer’s conduct, by ongoing treatment, or by settlement discussions. Tolling exists where a statute provides it, and the provisions that do so are narrow and specific rather than general.

The wrong deadline is worse than no deadline, because it produces confidence. A five-minute conversation sorts out which one governs. We talk these questions through with you. Call us at (800) 525-6386.

Working Out Which Deadline Governs

Sorting the periods is a document exercise rather than a judgment call, and it is far cheaper at the start of a claim than at the end of one. At Neumann Law Group, we handle injury and no-fault claims throughout Michigan, from Traverse City and Grand Rapids to Detroit. If you would like us to look at your situation, call (800) 525-6386 or contact us through our website.

Michigan’s no-fault act abolished most tort liability arising from the use of an insured motor vehicle, and then carved out a handful of exceptions. One of them lets a driver recover vehicle damage directly from the driver who caused it, up to a capped amount, and it is the smallest and most frequently used claim in Michigan traffic law.

The mini tort is that exception. MCL 500.3135(3)(e) allows damages of up to $1,000 to a motor vehicle, or up to $3,000 for motor vehicle accidents occurring after July 1, 2020, and only to the extent that the damages are not covered by insurance. That last clause does more work than the dollar figure does.

What the Statute Actually Allows

A mini tort claim is a tort claim against the at-fault driver for damage to a vehicle, capped by statute and limited to what insurance did not pay. The cap turns on the accident date rather than the filing date. Accidents on or before July 1, 2020 remain at the original $1,000 figure, and the higher amount reaches accidents after that date.

The phrase “to the extent that the damages are not covered by insurance” is the operative limit. A driver carrying collision coverage does not recover the repair bill through a mini tort, because the insurer paid it. What remains uncovered is the deductible, and for most claimants the mini tort claim is the deductible and nothing more.

A driver with no collision coverage is in a different position. There, the uncovered damage is the whole repair cost, and the statutory cap becomes the real ceiling on what a mini tort can return. I get asked whether the claim is worth the trouble for a few hundred dollars, and the answer turns almost entirely on which of those two situations a driver is in.

Where a Mini Tort Claim Is Filed

Subsection (4)(c) directs that the action be commenced, whenever legally possible, in the small claims division of the district court or in municipal court. The forum is part of the design. These are claims meant to be resolved without counsel, on a scale where hiring one would consume the recovery.

Subsection (4)(b) explains why these claims are paid the way they are. Mini tort liability is not a component of the residual liability for which the no-fault act requires drivers to maintain security, so the at-fault driver’s liability coverage does not answer for it. The money comes from the driver personally, which is the reason a demand letter to an individual is often more effective here than a claim to an insurer.

Removal carries a cost. Where either party removes the action to a higher court and does not prevail there, the judge may assess costs against them, which discourages using the removal as leverage.

Subsection (4)(d) is worth knowing about before filing. A decision in a mini tort action is not res judicata in any later proceeding determining other liability from the same circumstances. Losing a small claims case over a bumper does not decide an injury claim arising from the same collision.

Two Ways to Lose a Mini Tort Claim Outright

Damages in a mini tort action are assessed on comparative fault, and under subsection (4)(a) they must not be assessed in favor of a party who is more than 50% at fault. A driver mostly responsible for a collision recovers nothing here, and the same threshold governs the noneconomic damages claim, which our page on comparative fault in Michigan covers in more depth.

The second bar is insurance status. Subsection (4)(e) provides that damages must not be assessed where the damaged vehicle was being operated, at the time of the damage, without the security the no-fault act requires. An uninsured driver whose car is destroyed by someone else’s admitted negligence recovers nothing under this provision.

Those two rules together explain why a mini tort claim that looks straightforward can fail. Fault is assessed even in small claims court, and coverage status is checked.

How the Mini Tort Fits the Rest of a Claim

The mini tort sits alongside claims that behave nothing like it, and it is one of several exceptions in a Michigan personal injury case arising from a collision. Personal injury protection benefits come from a claimant’s own insurer regardless of fault and run on their own deadlines. A claim for noneconomic loss against the at-fault driver requires death, serious impairment of body function, or permanent serious disfigurement under MCL 500.3135(1). The mini tort requires none of that and returns none of it.

Intentional conduct sits outside the cap entirely. Subsection (3)(a) preserves tort liability for intentionally caused harm to persons or property, and the statute defines the term narrowly. A person does not act intentionally where they act, or refrain from acting, to avert injury to any person or damage to tangible property, even knowing harm is substantially certain to follow.

Keeping them separate matters because the deadlines and the proofs differ by claim type, and a driver who resolves the vehicle damage quickly has not resolved anything else. Our Michigan No-Fault Insurance Guide sets out how the coverage tiers introduced by the 2019 reform interact with each of these claims.

A mini tort claim is small, but it is often the first sign that a larger claim exists, and we handle both across Northern Michigan and statewide. One call is usually enough for us to tell you where things stand. Call us at (800) 525-6386.

When a Small Property Claim Signals a Larger One

A capped property claim is rarely the reason someone calls a lawyer, and it is often the first sign of a larger claim that has deadlines running against it already. At Neumann Law Group, we represent drivers and passengers injured throughout Michigan, including Traverse City, Grand Rapids, and Detroit. We are glad to talk through any of these questions. Call (800) 525-6386 or send us a message and we will get back to you.

A verdict figure and a judgment figure are different numbers in Michigan, and the distance between them is set by statute rather than by negotiation. A jury returns an amount for pain and suffering, and a separate provision then tells the court how to convert that amount into an enforceable judgment.

MCL 600.6306 governs the conversion in every personal injury action other than medical malpractice. It sets the order in which damages are entered, requires future damages to be reduced to present value, and applies the injured person’s share of fault to the total.

The Order the Statute Requires

Judgment is entered against each defendant, including a third-party defendant, in a sequence the statute lists. Past economic damages come first, less collateral source payments under MCL 600.6303. Past noneconomic damages come second and are entered as found.

Future damages follow, and each future category is reduced. Future economic damages are entered less health care costs and collectible collateral source payments, reduced to gross present cash value. Future medical and other health care costs are reduced to gross present cash value. Future noneconomic damages are reduced the same way.

Taxable and allowable costs come last, including interest as permitted by MCL 600.6013 or 600.6455. The sequence matters because reductions attach to particular categories rather than to the award as a whole, and because costs and interest are entered at the end of that sequence rather than alongside the damages they follow.

Judgment is entered against each defendant separately under this scheme, third-party defendants included, so a verdict against multiple parties is not simply one number owed jointly in the form the jury wrote it.

Five Percent a Year, Compounded

Gross present cash value is defined in the same section. It means the total amount of future damages reduced to present value at a rate of 5% per year, compounded annually, for each year in which those damages will accrue, as found by the trier of fact.

The consequence for a young, seriously injured plaintiff is substantial. Pain and suffering projected across decades is discounted at a compounding rate for every one of those years, so the further out a loss extends, the less each future year contributes to the judgment.

Past noneconomic damages are not discounted. That difference makes the allocation between past and future a real question at trial rather than a bookkeeping detail, because the same total split differently produces different judgments.

Then Comparative Fault Applies to the Total

Where the plaintiff was assigned a percentage of fault under MCL 600.6304, the total judgment amount is reduced by that percentage, subject to MCL 600.2959. The court then determines the ratio of total past damages to total future damages and allocates the deduction proportionally between them.

MCL 600.2959 supplies the ceiling that the molding provision defers to. Its comparison is not to a flat majority but to everyone else combined, parties and non-parties alike, and crossing that line removes the noneconomic award entirely while leaving a proportionally reduced economic recovery in place.

Allocated fault therefore does two things to a pain and suffering award. Below the line it reduces it proportionally. Above the line it eliminates it, while leaving a reduced economic recovery in place.

Malpractice Is Molded Under a Different Provision

MCL 600.6306 applies to a personal injury action other than an action for medical malpractice, and that carve-out is written into its first sentence. A malpractice verdict is converted under MCL 600.6306a instead, which MCL 600.2959 identifies as the alternative where it applies.

The practical point for anyone comparing outcomes is that a malpractice verdict and an auto verdict of the same size are not the same judgment. They are processed under different sections, and a figure quoted from one context does not transfer to the other.

Collateral source treatment is part of the same machinery. Past economic damages are entered less collateral source payments under MCL 600.6303, and future economic damages less those determined collectible under MCL 600.6303(5), so what an injured person’s own insurance already paid affects the judgment rather than the verdict.

Why the Threshold Question Comes First

None of this arithmetic is reached unless the claim clears the tort threshold. Noneconomic damages are available against an at-fault driver only where the injured person suffered death, serious impairment of body function, or permanent serious disfigurement under MCL 500.3135(1).

Two consequences follow for how a case is prepared. Evidence about how an injury changed a person’s life carries the threshold and also sizes the award, so it does double work. And evidence that sorts past from future loss affects the judgment independently of the total the jury writes down.

Our Michigan personal injury attorneys build both records from the outset, because neither can be assembled after a verdict. The comparative fault rules that reduce an award are argued from the same facts that establish it.

The 5% compounding rate is the figure most people have never heard and the one that moves a large award the most. It is worth understanding before a number is discussed. We talk these questions through with you. Call us at (800) 525-6386.

What an Award Is Worth After the Statute Applies

A settlement figure is only comparable to a verdict figure once the statutory reductions are accounted for, and that comparison is the one that should drive a decision. We represent injured people at Neumann Law Group throughout Michigan, including Traverse City, Grand Rapids, and Detroit. If you would like us to look at your situation, call (800) 525-6386 or contact us through our website.

A Michigan medical malpractice claim runs on a two-year limitations period that begins at the act or omission rather than at the moment a patient learns something went wrong. The mandatory notice of intent interacts with that period in a way that surprises people, because serving the notice does not restart the clock and under some circumstances does not stop it at all.

MCL 600.5856(c) tolls the limitations period when notice is given, subject to three conditions written into the same sentence. The notice must be given in compliance with the applicable notice period under MCL 600.2912b, the claim must be one that would be barred during that period, and the tolling runs no longer than the number of days remaining in the notice period after the date notice was given.

When the Claim Accrues and When It Is Discovered

A malpractice claim accrues at the time of the act or omission that is its basis, regardless of when the plaintiff discovers or otherwise has knowledge of it, under MCL 600.5838a(1). The limitations period is two years under MCL 600.5805(8).

Subsection (2) adds a discovery route. An action may be commenced within the otherwise applicable period, or within six months after the plaintiff discovers or should have discovered the existence of the claim, whichever is later. The burden of proving that the plaintiff neither discovered nor should have discovered the claim at least six months before the period expired sits with the plaintiff.

A six-year repose closes the outside edge. The claim may not be commenced later than six years after the act or omission, except where MCL 600.5851(7) or (8) applies, or where discovery was prevented by fraudulent conduct of the professional or facility. Our Michigan medical malpractice page sets out how those periods apply across different kinds of claims.

Whether the Claim Is Malpractice at All

The notice and affidavit requirements attach to medical malpractice claims, so the threshold question is whether a claim is one. MCL 600.5838a(1) defines the field by reference to who is being sued rather than to how badly the care went.

It reaches a licensed health care professional, a licensed health facility or agency, and an employee or agent of such a facility who is engaging in or assisting in medical care and treatment. A licensed health care professional means an individual licensed or registered under article 15 of the Public Health Code and engaged in the practice of their profession, and the statute expressly excludes a sanitarian and a veterinarian. A licensed health facility or agency means one licensed under article 17.

The distinction decides which rules apply. A claim that is ordinary negligence rather than malpractice carries no notice requirement and no affidavit, and runs on a different limitations analysis. Getting that characterization wrong at the outset produces either an unnecessary six-month delay or a complaint dismissed for skipping a step.

What the Notice Buys and What It Does Not

The tolling provision is narrower than it first reads. It applies where a claim would be barred during the notice period, which means it is a rescue for a claim already close to its deadline rather than an extension available to every claimant who serves a notice.

The cap is the part worth reading twice. Tolling lasts no longer than the days remaining in the applicable notice period after the notice was given. A claimant with 10 days left on the limitations period who serves a compliant notice gets the notice period tolled and then has those 10 days back. The clock is paused, not reset, and the days that were spent are gone.

Serving late therefore compresses everything that follows. Investigation, expert review, and the affidavit that must accompany the complaint all have to happen inside whatever remained when the notice went out.

A Defective Notice Tolls Nothing

The statute conditions tolling on notice given in compliance with MCL 600.2912b. A notice that does not comply is not a notice that tolls, and the consequence of that lands after the limitations period has already run.

The content requirements are specific. The notice states the factual basis of the claim, the standard of practice or care alleged, the manner in which it was breached, the action that should have been taken to comply, and the manner in which the breach caused the injury. Each is a place a notice can fall short.

The practical effect is that a claim can be timely when the notice is mailed and untimely by the time a court rules the notice inadequate. That sequence is the reason notices in this area are drafted with more care than their length suggests.

The Affidavit of Merit Is a Separate Requirement

Compliance with the notice does not end the filing obligations. Under MCL 600.2912d, the complaint must be filed with an affidavit of merit signed by a health professional the plaintiff’s attorney reasonably believes meets the expert requirements of MCL 600.2169.

That affidavit certifies the professional has reviewed the notice and the medical records supplied, and it states the applicable standard of practice or care, the opinion that it was breached, and the actions that should have been taken or omitted to comply with it. Securing a qualified reviewer takes time that the tolling cap does not create.

A calendar is more useful than a summary of the law when a malpractice deadline is close, and mapping those dates is something we do on a first call. If that is where your situation sits, call us at (800) 525-6386.

Mapping the Dates on a Malpractice Claim

The notice requirement and the limitations period are separate rules that fail together, and by the time the failure is visible it is usually not fixable. At Neumann Law Group, we represent patients and families in Michigan personal injury and malpractice claims from Traverse City, Grand Rapids, and Detroit. Call our office at (800) 525-6386, or contact us online, and we will talk it through with you.

Michigan writes nursing home residents’ rights into statute rather than leaving them to facility policy. That matters for families trying to judge whether something is wrong, because the most useful warning signs are not vague impressions of poor care. They are moments where a facility does something the law says a resident is entitled to refuse or to be told about.

MCL 333.20201 is the operative section of Michigan’s Public Health Code. It entitles a patient or resident to be free from mental and physical abuse and from restraints, to inspect their own medical record, to communicate privately with a physician or an attorney, and to receive appropriate care regardless of how that care is paid for. Each of those is a place where a warning sign has a legal name.

Sedation That Nobody Explained

A resident who becomes suddenly and persistently drowsy, withdrawn, or difficult to rouse may be under a chemical restraint, and the statute treats that as a restriction on their liberty rather than a treatment decision the facility makes alone.

Restraints are permitted only where authorized in writing by the attending physician, a physician’s assistant under a practice agreement, or an advanced practice registered nurse, for a specified and limited time, or where an emergency requires them to protect the resident from injury to self or others. In an emergency the restraint may only be applied by a qualified professional, who must set out the circumstances in writing and promptly report it to whoever authorized it.

Chemical restraints carry an additional check. The physician or advanced practice registered nurse who authorized the restraint must be consulted within 24 hours after it commences. A facility that cannot produce a written authorization, a specified duration, or that consultation has a documentation problem that is also a rights problem.

Being Told You Cannot See the Record

Families are frequently told that a chart is internal, that records take weeks, or that a request has to go through a corporate office. The statute is more direct. An individual who is or has been a patient or resident is entitled to inspect the medical record, or to receive a copy for a reasonable fee, under the Medical Records Access Act.

The right belongs to the resident, and the same subsection restricts giving a copy to a third party without the resident’s authorization, subject to what federal privacy rules permit or require. A family member acting under a valid authorization or as a legal representative is not a stranger to the record.

Records requests matter beyond curiosity. Bedsore staging, weight logs, and medication administration records are where a pattern becomes visible, and they are the documents most likely to be reconstructed if a request is delayed. Our page on bedsores in Michigan nursing homes explains what those records tend to show.

Isolation From Visitors, Mail, or an Attorney

A resident is entitled to associate and have private communications and consultations with their physician, with their attorney, or with any other individual of their choice, and to send and receive personal mail unopened on the same day it arrives. Those rights may be limited only where medically contraindicated and documented in the record by the attending physician, a physician’s assistant, or an advanced practice registered nurse.

The statute goes further and says a resident’s civil and religious liberties, including the right to independent personal decisions and to knowledge of available choices, may not be infringed, and that the facility is to encourage and assist in the fullest exercise of them.

A facility that discourages visits, routes calls, opens mail, or resists a private conversation with counsel is not exercising discretion. It is doing something the section forbids absent a documented medical reason.

Two Rights Specific to Nursing Homes

The section carries a further list that applies to nursing home patients rather than to every health facility, and two of those entries are worth knowing before they are needed.

A nursing home patient has the right to have their spouse, next of kin, or patient’s representative stay at the facility 24 hours a day where the patient is considered terminally ill by the physician responsible for their care, a physician’s assistant under a practice agreement, or an advanced practice registered nurse. Families are often given visiting hours instead, at exactly the point the statute stops applying them.

Each nursing home patient also has the right to receive representatives of approved organizations, as provided in MCL 333.21763. A facility discouraging or screening those visits is worth noting alongside the rest of a timeline.

Care That Seems to Track the Payment Source

A resident may not be denied appropriate care on the basis of race, religion, color, national origin, sex, age, disability, marital status, sexual preference, or source of payment. The last item on that list is the one families notice without knowing it is prohibited.

Changes in attentiveness that coincide with a shift from private pay to Medicaid, or with a coverage question, are worth writing down with dates. So is a facility raising payment in a conversation about care. Patterns like that are hard to reconstruct later and straightforward to record as they happen.

A written timeline kept by a family is often the most useful document in a nursing home case, and it is worth having one reviewed early. We are glad to look at it with you before anything is filed. Call us at (800) 525-6386.

When a Family Suspects Something Is Wrong

Statutory rights are only useful where somebody notices they were ignored, and the noticing usually falls to a family that is already stretched. We represent residents and their families at Neumann Law Group in Michigan nursing home negligence matters, one part of our Michigan personal injury practice, across the state from Traverse City to Detroit. We are happy to talk it through with you. Call (800) 525-6386 or contact our office.

The obviousness of a hazard no longer decides whether a Michigan property owner owed a duty to the person hurt by it. That question moved to two later elements of a negligence case, and the practical consequence is that a case which once ended on a motion now usually reaches a factfinder. The exposure did not disappear, though. It relocated.

The Michigan Supreme Court made the change in Kandil-Elsayed v F & E Oil, Inc., decided July 28, 2023 together with Pinsky v Kroger Co of Michigan. A land possessor owes a duty to exercise reasonable care to protect invitees from an unreasonable risk of harm caused by a dangerous condition of the land, and the open and obvious nature of a condition is now analyzed as part of breach and comparative fault rather than duty.

What the Court Actually Overruled

The decision overruled Lugo v Ameritech Corp in two identified respects, and the distinction between them matters when reading older material.

The first is the one usually described. Lugo made the open and obvious danger doctrine part of a land possessor’s duty, and the Court overruled that, holding instead that obviousness is relevant to breach and to the parties’ comparative fault.

The second is stated more narrowly than it is often repeated. The Court overruled the special-aspects doctrine, under which a possessor could be liable for an open and obvious condition only where the invitee produced evidence of special aspects such as a condition being effectively unavoidable or presenting a substantial risk of death or severe injury. The syllabus records that it was overruled to the extent it was inconsistent with the standard in § 343A of the Second Restatement of Torts, which asks whether the land possessor should have anticipated the harm.

Both cases arrived the same way, which is part of why they were heard together. Kandil-Elsayed slipped and fell on snow and ice at a gas station in a Wayne Circuit Court case. Renee Pinsky tripped over a cable strung from a checkout counter to a display basket in Washtenaw Circuit Court. In each, the defendant moved for summary disposition under MCR 2.116(C)(10) on the ground that the hazard was open and obvious with no special aspects, so no duty was owed.

The Court concluded that each defendant did owe the injured plaintiff a duty of care, and that genuine issues of material fact remained. Neither case was decided on the merits. Both were returned to be litigated under the framework the decision announced, which is what a shift from duty to breach produces in practice.

The Standard That Replaced Special Aspects

The replacement is an anticipation-of-harm test taken from the Second Restatement. Where a land possessor should anticipate the harm that results from an open and obvious condition, despite its obviousness, the possessor is not relieved of the duty of reasonable care.

That standard is broader than the two illustrations Lugo had offered. A hazard need not be effectively unavoidable or life-threatening for the duty to survive. It needs to be one whose harm a reasonable possessor should have anticipated, which is a question about foreseeability in the ordinary sense rather than a narrow category.

The Court also noted that the Third Restatement has largely eliminated status-based categories in favor of one general duty of reasonable care, and declined to follow it. The Second Restatement approach remains the governing approach in Michigan, so the invitee, licensee, and trespasser distinctions continue to apply. Our Michigan premises liability page sets out how those categories change what a property owner owes.

Obviousness Now Routes Into Comparative Fault

Moving obviousness out of duty did not make it harmless to a claim. MCL 600.2959 requires a court to reduce damages by the injured person’s percentage of comparative fault. Where that percentage is greater than the aggregate fault of everyone else, whether or not they are parties, economic damages are reduced accordingly and noneconomic damages are not awarded at all.

A hazard that is genuinely obvious is evidence that the person who encountered it bore some responsibility for doing so. Under the old rule that observation ended the case at the duty stage. Under the current one it becomes an argument for allocating a majority of fault to the plaintiff, which reaches the same result for pain and suffering by a different route.

What changed is who decides and when. A jury now weighs obviousness alongside everything else, rather than a judge treating it as dispositive on the papers, and that shift is worth something real. It is not the same as obviousness ceasing to matter.

What This Means for an Older Slip and Fall Page or Letter

Material written before July 2023 that describes special aspects as the only path around an open and obvious hazard is describing law that no longer governs. So is an insurer’s denial letter built on that framework, and those letters still circulate.

The reverse error is now common too. A claim is not strong merely because Lugo was overruled, since breach, causation, damages, and the fault allocation all remain to be proved. Both readings overstate what one decision did, in opposite directions. Our page on slip and fall accidents in Michigan covers what proof a premises case still needs.

A denial letter resting on special aspects is applying a rule the Supreme Court retired in 2023. Those letters are worth a second read. Call our office at (800) 525-6386 and we will walk through it with you.

Reassessing a Fall Claim Under the Current Rule

The framework changed recently enough that older guidance is still in circulation and still persuading people not to pursue claims. At Neumann Law Group, we handle Michigan personal injury claims for people hurt on other people’s property throughout the state, including Grand Traverse County, Kent County, and Wayne County. Call us at (800) 525-6386 or contact our office to arrange a consultation.

Michigan drivers have been choosing how much personal injury protection coverage to carry since policies issued or renewed after July 1, 2020. The choice was presented as a premium decision. It is also a decision about who pays for catastrophic care, and the answer when a chosen limit is exhausted is not the one most drivers assume.

A driver whose coverage runs out is not simply left with the balance. MCL 500.3135(3)(c) preserves tort liability against the at-fault driver for allowable expenses, work loss, and survivor’s loss, including all future allowable expenses and work loss, in excess of the applicable limit. The excess becomes a claim against the person who caused the crash.

The Coverage Levels the Statute Actually Sets

MCL 500.3107c(1) sets four coverage levels, and a driver selects one when a policy is issued or renewed. They are a limit of $50,000 per individual per loss occurrence, $250,000, $500,000, or no limit at all.

The $50,000 level is not open to everyone. It is available only where the applicant or named insured is enrolled in Medicaid, and where their spouse and any resident relative has qualified health coverage, is enrolled in Medicaid, or carries their own no-fault PIP.

Whichever level is selected applies to the named insured, their spouse, and any relative of either domiciled in the same household, along with anyone else with a right to claim benefits under the policy. Where benefits are payable under two or more policies, subsection (6) caps them at an aggregate equal to the highest available limit under any one of those policies rather than adding them together.

Insurers carrying one of the capped tiers must also offer a rider providing attendant care above the applicable limit. That rider is the provision most relevant to a catastrophic injury, and whether it was offered and declined is worth establishing from the file rather than from memory.

Two further options sit outside that section, which is why the choice is often described as six options rather than four. A complete election not to maintain PIP is made under MCL 500.3107d, and a coordination exclusion runs through MCL 500.3109a(2). The distinction matters because the consequences of exhausting a tier and the consequences of electing out are not the same, as the next section shows. Our Michigan No-Fault Insurance Guide sets out how each option interacts with health insurance.

What the At-Fault Driver Still Owes

The excess claim under MCL 500.3135(3)(c) is the provision most worth understanding before a limit is chosen. Where a driver carries a $250,000 tier and a brain injury exhausts it, the allowable expenses and work loss above that figure remain recoverable from the at-fault driver, and the statute says so for future expenses as well as incurred ones.

The claim is broader still where a driver elected out under MCL 500.3107d, or where a MCL 500.3109a(2) exclusion applies. In those cases the statute allows recovery of allowable expenses without limit, rather than only the amount above a tier.

One offset applies. The party liable for damages is entitled to a reduction equal to the taxes that would have been payable on the income the injured person would have earned had they not been injured, so a work loss recovery is calculated on an after-tax basis.

Whether a tier was exhausted is a question the declarations page answers in about a minute, and we are glad to read one for you. We talk these questions through with you. Call us at (800) 525-6386.

The Opt-Out Carries a 30-Day Cliff

An election not to maintain PIP under MCL 500.3107d(1) is available to a qualified person whose spouse and resident relatives have qualified health coverage or their own no-fault PIP. The insurer must be given a document from the health coverage provider naming everyone covered.

Subsection (3)(e) is the part that catches people, and the form is required to disclose it in a conspicuous manner. Where the qualified health coverage ceases during the policy term, the person has 30 days after the termination takes effect to obtain PIP coverage. Missing that window excludes them from all personal protection benefits for the period the coverage was not maintained.

A job change, a plan termination, or a spouse’s coverage lapsing can start that clock without anyone connecting it to auto insurance. The exclusion is not a penalty a court weighs. It follows from the statute.

What Happens When No Valid Selection Was Made

The statute anticipates that the paperwork will sometimes be missing or defective, and the consequences favor the insured. MCL 500.3107c(2) requires the form to state the benefits and risks of each option conspicuously, to let the applicant mark that they read and understood the options, to allow the selection to be marked, and to be signed.

Where no effective selection was made but a premium or installment was paid, subsection (3) creates a rebuttable presumption that the amount paid accurately reflects the coverage level applicable to the policy. The presumption can be argued with, and the premium records are what it turns on.

Where no effective selection was made and that presumption does not apply, subsection (4) provides that subsection (1)(d) governs the policy. Subsection (1)(d) is the unlimited option. A defective or absent selection can therefore leave a policy with no PIP cap at all, which is the reverse of what an adjuster describing a capped tier will usually assume.

Coverage decisions made at renewal, often by phone and often to reduce a premium, are rarely remembered accurately years later. The declarations page and the signed selection form are the record, and obtaining both early is the difference between arguing about a limit and establishing one. At Neumann Law Group, we handle Michigan personal injury claims arising from motor vehicle collisions for drivers throughout the state.

Finding Out What a Policy Actually Covers

An exhausted PIP limit is the point where a no-fault claim becomes a claim against a person rather than an insurer, and the two are proved differently. At Neumann Law Group, we represent injured drivers and passengers from Traverse City, Grand Rapids, and Detroit. If you would like us to look at your situation, call (800) 525-6386 or contact us through our website.

Michigan’s no-fault act sets more than one deadline, and the two that matter most in a personal injury protection claim both run for a year while doing completely different jobs. One decides when a lawsuit can still be filed. The other decides how far back the benefits reach once it is.

MCL 500.3145(1) bars an action for PIP benefits later than one year after the date of the accident, subject to two exceptions that reopen it. Subsection (2) carries the second rule, and it is the one that quietly costs money. A claimant cannot recover benefits for any portion of the loss incurred more than one year before the date the action was commenced, however timely the filing itself was.

The One-Year Deadline and Its Two Exceptions

The one-year bar is not absolute, and a great deal turns on that. An action filed more than a year after the accident survives where written notice of injury was given to the insurer within one year after the accident, or where the insurer has already made a payment of PIP benefits for that injury.

The notice itself is a modest document. Under subsection (4), it may be given by the claimant or by someone acting on their behalf, and it must give the claimant’s name and address and state, in ordinary language, the name of the person injured and the time, place, and nature of the injury. A letter meeting that description, sent inside the first year, changes which rule governs the case.

Where notice was given or a payment was made, subsection (2) allows the action to be commenced at any time within one year after the most recent allowable expense, work loss, or survivor’s loss was incurred. For an injury that generates ongoing treatment, that can extend the filing window well past the anniversary of the crash. At Neumann Law Group, our personal injury attorneys handle Michigan car accident claims from Grand Traverse County to Wayne County, and this is the provision most often missed by someone who assumed the claim had expired.

What the One-Year-Back Rule Actually Limits

The one-year-back rule is a limit on recovery rather than a limit on time. Even where the action is properly commenced, the claimant may not recover benefits for any portion of the loss incurred more than one year before the date of commencement.

The practical effect is that delay costs money on a claim that never becomes untimely. Someone who is treated for two years, then files suit, has a live claim and a recovery reaching back only 12 months from the filing date. The earlier bills do not become disputed. They fall outside what the statute permits the court to award.

The mistake I see most often is not a missed filing date. It is a claimant who waited, filed inside the deadline, and then learned that a year of medical expenses sat outside the window the statute allows.

Subsection (5) adds a third one-year rule that behaves unlike the other two. An action for recovery of property protection insurance benefits may not be commenced later than one year after the accident, and the statute attaches no notice exception and no payment exception to it. That period is flat.

When the Clock Stops

Subsection (3) tolls the limitations period under subsection (2) from the date a specific claim for payment is made until the date the insurer formally denies that claim. An insurer sitting on a claim does not run out the clock by doing so.

The tolling carries a condition worth reading closely. It does not apply where the person claiming benefits fails to pursue the claim with reasonable diligence. Submitting a claim and then going quiet is not the same as pursuing it, and the burden of showing diligence sits with the claimant.

A formal denial is the event that restarts the period. Ambiguous correspondence from an adjuster, a request for more records, or a partial payment is not a denial, and treating one as though it were can cost a claimant months of tolling they were entitled to.

The Tort Claim Runs on Its Own Clock

Michigan claimants are frequently told they have three years, and for one kind of claim that is right. Sorting out which period governs which claim is the first thing worth doing in any Michigan personal injury matter arising from a collision, because the answer differs by claim within the same crash. MCL 600.5805(2) sets a three-year period for actions to recover damages for injury to a person or property. That is the period for a tort claim against the at-fault driver.

It is not the period for PIP benefits. Those come from a claimant’s own insurer under the no-fault act, and MCL 500.3145 governs them. The two run side by side on the same crash, and applying the three-year figure to the benefits claim is the most common way a Michigan no-fault claim is lost. Both deadlines, along with PIP coverage tiers after the 2019 reform, are covered on our Michigan No-Fault Insurance Guide.

MCL 500.3145 was itself amended by the 2019 reform, so a policy or an article written before June 2019 may describe a structure that no longer governs. Anything a claimant reads about no-fault deadlines is worth dating before it is relied on.

Nothing about the structure is obvious from an insurance policy, and the deadlines start running before most people have finished treatment. If that is where your situation sits, call us at (800) 525-6386.

Checking Which Clock Is Running on a Claim

A PIP claim can be timely and still be worth substantially less than it should be, which is a distinction the statute draws and an adjuster has no reason to explain. We represent injured drivers and passengers at Neumann Law Group across Michigan, from Detroit and Grand Rapids to Traverse City. Call our office at (800) 525-6386, or contact us online, and we will talk it through with you.

A Michigan wrongful death recovery does not simply pass to the estate and then to whoever inherits under a will. The proceeds are distributed by court order, after a hearing, among a class of people the statute defines, and a family member can be shut out of that distribution by missing a date rather than by anything about their relationship to the person who died.

MCL 600.2922 sets out both the damages and the distribution. The personal representative brings the action, but the money is divided by the court considering the relative damages sustained by each person entitled to claim, which is a different question from who the decedent named in a will.

Who the Statute Lets Claim

Subsection (3) defines the class. It reaches the deceased’s spouse, children, descendants, parents, grandparents, brothers and sisters, and, if none of those survive, the people to whom the estate would pass under the laws of intestate succession determined as of the date of death.

It also reaches the children of the deceased’s spouse, which brings in stepchildren who would take nothing under intestacy. And it reaches devisees under the will, including beneficiaries of a trust under the will, people the will designates as possibly entitled to damages under this section, and beneficiaries of a living trust where the will devises to that trust.

The class is therefore wider than the heirs and wider than the beneficiaries, and the people in it may not know they are. Our Michigan wrongful death page covers who may bring the action itself, which is a narrower question than who may share in it.

Two Deadlines That Run Against Family Members

Subsection (8) imposes a duty on anyone who may be entitled to damages. Within 60 days after service of the complaint and the statutory notice, that person must advise the attorney for the personal representative of any material fact within their knowledge that may constitute evidence of a claim for damages. A court may bar their right to claim proceeds at the hearing if they do not.

Subsection (7) sets the harder cutoff. A person who may be entitled to damages must present a claim for damages to the personal representative on or before the date set for the hearing on the motion to distribute proceeds. Failure to present a claim within that time bars the person from making a claim to any of the proceeds.

Both run against people who are usually not the ones managing the litigation, and the notice the statute requires is what tells them the clock exists. The required notice must say so expressly, including that failure to advise within 60 days may adversely affect recovery and could bar a claim at the hearing.

How the Hearing Works

The personal representative files a motion for authority to distribute the proceeds, and the court orders a hearing on it. Unless waived, notice is served on everyone who may be entitled to damages, in the manner provided by the rules applicable to probate proceedings.

Where an interested person is a minor, a disappeared person, or an incapacitated individual without a fiduciary, the court appoints a fiduciary or guardian ad litem first, and notice goes to that appointee. After the hearing, the court orders payment from the proceeds of the reasonable medical, hospital, funeral, and burial expenses of the decedent for which the estate is liable, and the proceeds may not be applied to any other charge against the estate.

The court then enters an order distributing the remainder among the people in subsection (3) who suffered damages, and to the estate for conscious pain and suffering, in amounts it considers fair and equitable given the relative damages of each. Where a jury returned a special verdict, damages are distributed as that verdict provides.

The Estate Has Its Own Share

The distribution order separates two things that are often treated as one. The people in subsection (3) who suffered damages take their shares directly, while compensation for the conscious pain and suffering the deceased underwent between injury and death is distributed to the estate rather than to any individual.

That share then passes as estate property, which means a will or the intestacy rules govern it, and a person who shares in the wrongful death proceeds may take nothing from it. The two paths run under different rules in the same order.

Note also that where no member of the listed family class survives, the class is filled by those to whom the estate would pass under the laws of intestate succession determined as of the date of death. The reference point is the date of death, not the date of the hearing or of any later change in circumstances.

Settlements Need Court Approval Too

A settlement of a pending wrongful death action is not concluded between the parties alone. Where the personal representative moves for leave to settle, the court conducts a hearing and approves or rejects the proposed settlement, with or without notice.

The damages the statute permits shape what a settlement is measured against. They include reasonable medical, hospital, funeral, and burial expenses for which the estate is liable, reasonable compensation for the pain and suffering the deceased consciously underwent between injury and death, and damages for loss of financial support and loss of the society and companionship of the deceased.

One shortcut exists. Where none of the people entitled to proceeds is a minor, a disappeared person, or a legally incapacitated individual, and all of them sign a verified written stipulation specifying each share, the court enters its order in accordance with that agreement.

The date set for the distribution hearing is the one families should know about early, because it is the date a claim has to be in by. If that is where your situation sits, call us at (800) 525-6386.

Before the Distribution Hearing Is Set

Families often learn how the proceeds will be divided only after the litigation is over, when the deadlines that governed their share have already passed. We handle wrongful death claims at Neumann Law Group and the distribution that follows them across Michigan, and our broader Michigan personal injury practice sits behind that work. Call our office at (800) 525-6386, or contact us online, and we will talk it through with you.