People in Nevada have insurance for many different things. They have insurance for their vehicles, homes, medical needs, lives and other pieces of property. They have insurance for these aspects of life to protect themselves from incurring massive expenses they would not be able to afford on their own. However, there are more than just the insurance policy owners who benefit from the insurance payments.
The people receiving the insurance payments to complete the repairs or provide the medical care also benefit by receiving the payments from insurance companies. Given the size of the insurance industry, there are people who may take advantage of the insurance company and try and get more insurance proceeds than they should receive.
Common types of insurance fraud
When people do this, they could be committing insurance fraud, which encompasses many different schemes that allows them to obtain insurance proceeds they should not receive. Depending on the industry, the schemes will be different, but some of the common examples of insurance fraud are:
- Auto insurance applications: People may misreport the information about the vehicle when applying for insurance coverage. They may underreport the mileage on the vehicle, state that it will be in a garage when it is not and have unrecognized drivers.
- Auto accident coverage: Medical providers may overstate the amount of medical costs that injured people receive after a car accident. Autobody shops may also inflate the cost of repairs to the vehicles
- Healthcare fraud: Medical providers may bill for services not provided; code for a more expensive procedure when a cheaper one was performed; filing duplicate claims; unbundle services that should be billed together and other actions
- Workers compensation: Employers may misrepresent the number of employees they have or the type of work they perform. Employees may receive unnecessary medical procedures to keep collecting workers’ compensation benefits
- Disaster-related claims: When there is a major disaster with lots of damage, claims contractors may make exaggerated claims and fix it for much less
Insurance fraud is very costly for insurance companies in Nevada. It is important that insurance companies are able to recover when fraud occurs and consulting with experienced attorneys could be helpful.
