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Texas insurance glossary

Subrogation

Subrogation is an insurer's right to step into its own customer's shoes and recover what it paid out from whoever actually caused the loss.

Sources checked

It is why a claim can be paid quickly under your own collision coverage even when the other driver was plainly at fault. Your insurer pays you, then pursues theirs.

Your deductible rides along. If the recovery succeeds in full, the deductible normally comes back to you; if it succeeds in part, it usually comes back in proportion. Nothing about that is automatic in the sense of being instant — subrogation can run for months after the repair.

It is also the reason an insurer wants the other driver’s details at the first call, and the reason it dislikes a customer signing anything that releases them.

Sources: TDI — home insurance glossary; TDI — consumer bill of rights for personal automobile insurance (CB005). Verified .

A definition, not legal advice and not a quote. Rules and figures change; confirm your own situation against the source named above, or with us, before you act on it. Last checked .

See also

  • Deductible A deductible is the amount of a claim the policyholder keeps: the insurer pays the covered loss above it, and nothing at or below it.
  • Collision coverage Collision coverage pays to repair or replace the insured’s own vehicle after it hits another vehicle or an object, or overturns, whoever was at fault.
  • Uninsured motorist Uninsured motorist coverage pays the insured for injury and damage caused by a driver who has no liability insurance, or by a hit-and-run driver who is never identified.
  • At-fault Texas is an at-fault state, which means the driver who caused a crash is the one whose liability coverage pays for the harm done to everybody else.

Where this is handled

Knowing what a coverage is called is not the same as knowing what is on your policy. One independent agency can read your declarations page with you and compare the markets that will write your record.

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