Ep. 49 – Unraveling the Complexities of Injury Settlements

John Cattie, Jr.:
In my experience, there’s not enough discussion on the front end of the case to inform that victim that when we get to the end of this road there are going to be medical liens that need to get addressed. The ability to resolve those efficiently, effectively is going to be a great way to maximize the amount of money you’re going to be able to walk away with and have in your pocket when we’re all said and done.

David Craig – Host:
I’m attorney Dave Craig, managing partner and one of the founders of the law firm of Craig, Kelley, & Faultless. I’ve represented people who’ve been seriously injured or who’ve had a family member killed in a semi or other big truck wreck for over 30 years.

Following the wreck, their lives are chaos. Often they don’t even know enough about the process to ask the right questions. It is my goal to empower you by providing you with the information you need to protect yourself and your family. In each and every episode, I will interview top experts and professionals that are involved in truck wreck cases. This is After The Crash.

Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to another episode of After The Crash, the podcast. Today I’m fortunate to have John Cattie Jr. He’s a nationally known speaker, attorney, author. I’m excited to have him today, because he’s going to talk about something that not all clients understand or know about, and unfortunately there are some lawyers who don’t either. We’re going to dig into it, but John, welcome to the podcast.

John Cattie, Jr.:
Thank you, Dave. Such a pleasure to be here, thanks for the invitation to join you today.

David Craig – Host:
I think one of the things that’s always interesting to me is that when I sit down with a client, they’re always focused on, “How much money are we going to settle for? How much money do we settle for? How much is the jury verdict going to be?” They’re always focused on that number.

I always tell my clients that the real number that they should be focused on is how much money are they going to get to keep, and that isn’t always reflective of how much money I get, because we owe money out when we collect money.

I tell clients, “There’s two ways for me to get you money. One is to get you as much money from the other side as I possibly can, and two is to pay back people we owe as little as possible.”

It seems to me that they miss that second part, and you’re the perfect person to talk about this, so let’s talk a little bit. Is that your experience as well?

John Cattie, Jr.:
It is. It is, Dave. Putting myself in the shoes of an injury victim or the relative or friend of an injury victim, there’s a few things that are going on, I think, in their minds during this. Number one is someone has been injured, someone that they care about, someone that they love, someone that they’re close to.

Perhaps that injury is catastrophic in nature, depending on the incident and the crash that occurred. There’s this sense of, “We really want to get justice. We want to get what we deserve at the end of the day from those that have done wrong and were negligent.”

That’s going on in their heads. At the same time, there’s this desire to want to be able to turn the page and start a new life, and start a new life hopefully with adequate means, and dare I say, in a financially better position perhaps than they were prior.
I think that so much focus from the injury victim’s perspective is on what’s that final number going to look like? The final number in their mind is typically what I call that top-line number. What is going to be that ultimate offer from the insurance company that we’re going to say yes to? Or what are we going to get when we go to trial and we really get to state our case and the jury sides with us 100%?

The real number that injury victims ought to be caring about is what I call the bottom-line number. Which is the top-line number, which is the ultimate amount of the settlement or the judgment in the injury victim’s favor, but really it’s that number less any sort of offsets, any sort of expenses that need to be taken care of that have occurred and accumulated during the life of the case. One of the biggest numbers typically or biggest issues to determine the difference between the top-line number and the bottom-line number, the number that ultimately is the money going to the injury victim, are healthcare liens.

David Craig – Host:
Absolutely. The great thing, ladies and gentlemen, is John’s law firm is a law firm that is geared towards protecting that amount of money that folks get, and to protect their rights and their benefits going forward, and to minimize those health insurance liens or what other kind of liens there are. His firm does that, and not all law firms do that. A lot of personal injury law firms dabble in it. We might do some of it. But John’s firm, that’s what they do. I guess out of curiosity, what got you into this area?

John Cattie, Jr.:
This company was building out this new business group and they wanted someone with a legal background, with an entrepreneurial itch. Someone willing to take a little bit of risk to go out there and make this their own and own it. I started with that company in 2008, a company called Garretson Resolution Group.

For almost a decade I was working with Garretson Resolution Group in the Medicare set-aside context. Not really having anything to do with healthcare liens, but the company becoming a pioneer in the healthcare liens resolution industry, both in the single-event, single-crash context, and in the mass-tort context.

Fast-forward to 2016, I’m looking to make a change for a variety of reasons, and I look around the landscape of the country of folks that are doing this Medicare set-aside work, lien resolution work, and I make this observation. There’s a lot of personal injury attorneys that do this kind of work in their own firm, or they have a paralegal that’s doing it, and they’re on a one-off basis trying to handle this situation.

There are companies that do this type of work and make it their business to do it, and these companies, sometimes, some of them have licensed attorneys who are working for them even though they’re not practicing law. They can’t give legal advice, but they’re doing this kind of work in a larger scale.

But there were no law firms that were doing lien resolution work and preservation of future access to Medicare and Medicaid benefits. For literally weeks, I was scratching my head trying to figure out why is there nobody who is doing this kind of work? It seems like when you’re trying to resolve a healthcare lien that’s based on federal law or state law, if you’re trying to protect someone’s future access to Medicare or Medicaid benefits, it would be beneficial to have attorneys doing that work who are able to give clients legal advice.

That’s something that I think would be appreciated, but why is nobody doing this? I honestly could not come up with a good, valid reason as to the reason why. In 2016, I stepped out and made a big decision, went out there on a thin limb, so to speak, and I left Garretson. I opened up my own law firm, and since 2016, we started initially giving legal advice about Medicare set-asides, and over time we began to develop and work and provide support and advice around healthcare liens.

Here we are in fall of 2024. We have a national footprint doing this kind of work on behalf of injury victims and their personal injury attorneys as well as workers’ comp attorneys around the country, and we’ve got a team of about 20 folks who are doing this kind of work on behalf of our clients today.

David Craig – Host:
You have an MBA and law degree, correct?

John Cattie, Jr.:
That’s right.

David Craig – Host:
That’s made you the perfect person, as far as an entrepreneur, that have an interest. You obviously have an interest in business as well.

John Cattie, Jr.:
Well, Dave. Funny thing about that. I went to law school at Villanova. Started there in my first year, and about midway through the first semester, the opportunity presented itself for me to also be able to get my MBA at the same time. I said, “You know what? I’m already studying really hard. I’m in law school. I don’t have much life outside of school.”

You can appreciate this. I was like, “Why not? It’ll extend my stay at Villanova for one more semester. I’ll have dual master’s degrees and I’ll be ready to go.” So, I made that commitment knowing that, as a general rule, lawyers aren’t necessarily known as the most astute of business people. I thought by getting that dual degree, I may have a leg up. Who knows what’s coming in the future, but at least I’ll be as prepared as I possibly can.

David Craig – Host:
I want to tell folks, because this podcast is designed for ordinary people, not necessarily lawyers, although we get lawyers that listen to it. People don’t necessarily know. I picked a niche, and the niche that I picked was truck wrecks, commercial motor vehicles regulated by federal law, state law, local laws, industry standards.

You have to know that area. I’ve had a lot of people on this podcast, guests, experts, reconstructionists, defense lawyers, mediators, who will tell you that there’s an advantage if you’re in a truck wreck to pick someone who is niche, who’s board certified, who knows that area of law.

Because when you graduate from law school, they give you a diploma and they give you a JD, and you can go practice any type of law you want to, but that doesn’t mean you’re good at every type of law. As a lawyer, as somebody who does this, it’s like a surgeon. If I was going to go get cancer surgery or cancer treatment, I wouldn’t get it from my general practitioner.

If I had to have a colon surgery, I’d go to a surgeon, internal medicine surgeon. We know that in the medical side, you ought to pick people who are really good at that specific area, but ladies and gentlemen, the law is no different. John has a niche that there’s not many law firms, like he said, out there doing this niche. Have you found it rewarding now that you’ve done it now for quite a few years? Has it been rewarding for you?

John Cattie, Jr.:
It has been the greatest challenge and joy of my professional life, Dave. You can speak to this as a business owner, also. The ability to start something at the ground level that is yours and you’re in control of the success of your venture. It’s based on your work, your effort, your smarts, the decisions that you make, and the emotion and care that you put into it. Doing what I’m doing right now as the managing partner of Cattie & Gonzalez, it’s the greatest joy and challenge at the same time of my professional career.

David Craig – Host:
Folks, what we’re talking to John about is that when you are involved in a personal injury case, and it’s a serious case, and you have liens and your health insurance pays your bills, or Medicaid or Medicare or VA. Your bills are getting paid. A lot of people don’t even understand that very first principle.

First thing is there’s subrogation rights. The first thing is that you have to pay these people back. I get asked all the time, “Well, why do I have to pay? I’ve been paying premiums, or I’ve paid into social security my entire life. Why in the world do I have to pay people back?” Folks, you do. If you don’t take that part into consideration, you’re missing a big part of the equation. John, let’s talk about first of all, what kind of folks do we have to pay back?

John Cattie, Jr.:
Yep. Generally speaking, Dave, folks who are providing medical care for injury victims during the life of their case — it can be existing on the federal level, it can be existing on the state level, the local level. It can be private health insurance. It can be as an extension of the military. It can be employers in the workers’ compensation context.

A variety of folks are going to be in the position to pay an injury victim’s medical expenses while their case is ongoing. In my experience, there’s not enough discussion on the front end of the case to inform that victim that when we get to the end of this road, there are going to be medical liens that need to get addressed.

Medical liens, the ability to resolve those efficiently, effectively is going to be a great way to maximize the amount of money you’re going to be able to walk away with and have in your pocket when we’re all said and done. Working with these liens and trying to communicate and negotiate with lien holders is something that, like what you do in your niche of truck crashes, our niche here is healthcare lien resolution and preservation of benefits.

Being able to focus a practice on one particular area, as opposed to trying to address it, all allows you to drill really deep on that one area and establish a deep-rooted subject matter expertise, and connections and network, and knowledge of the system. How is the game getting played, so that you can as quickly and efficiently as possible get to the best possible lien results, in my case.

David Craig – Host:
Those liens, those folks that pay the medical bills, they’re not all treated the same under the law. Some get preferential treatment. Some get, they’re entitled to 100% payback, or at least that’s what they claim.

John Cattie, Jr.:
That’s right. Sometimes, Dave, those lien holders who are saying that they’re owed 100% back, just because they say that doesn’t necessarily make it so. I see so many folks who are confounded by healthcare liens on a personal injury case, and they’re hitting brick walls and frustrated by what they’re getting back in terms of lack of willingness to negotiate and reduce.
They tend to give up the fight too early, and that’s a real problem. Part of that, Dave, stems from the timing of when the lien is started to get worked. A lot of times we get to a position, I see it every day. I get calls. “Hey, John. I represent Jane Doe. Jane Doe was in a truck crash in North Carolina, and we just had mediation yesterday and we got to a settlement, and I want to hire you guys to put Medicare and Medicaid on notice and negotiate those liens for us.”

While I may take that case and provide assistance on it, the assistance that I’m going to be providing, and just like anybody else, is not nearly as substantial as if I was called a year earlier to say, “Hey, listen, I represent Jane Doe. Jane Doe was in a truck crash in North Carolina.

“Case is not settled yet. Mediation is not scheduled yet. But she’s enrolled in Medicare and Medicaid, and I know at the end of the day we’re going to have to resolve these liens. I want to get you to go ahead and get started with that now, because I know it’s going to take time to get the best possible result.”

Allowing for more time to be able to work those liens effectively is a really great strategy, and something injury victims need to be in their attorney’s ears about on their case to make sure that, while the attorney and the firm are building the case up from a damages perspective to get to that best top line number, things that are affecting the bottom-line number need to also be getting worked in a similar maybe parallel fashion, so that when we do get to mediation or get to trial and we’re getting that result that that injury victim deserves, then the top-line number is going to be as high as it can be and the bottom-line number is going to be as high as it can be.

David Craig – Host:
I think folks that are listening is that, and again, that top-line number… Let’s say we’re negotiating a case and we’re negotiating a $6 million settlement. Everybody is focused on that $6 million and they’re at $5,900,000 and we’re trying to get them to $6 million. We’re fighting over that $100,000.

What they’re losing sight of is they may owe $300,000 in medical expenses, liens. They don’t fight nearly as hard for $100,000 on the bottom as they fight for that $100,000 on the top. The crazy thing is a lot of lawyers charge 37% to 40% on that top $100,000 that they’re fighting over.

A big chunk of that top number goes off in attorney fees, and the bottom number, you don’t necessarily have as big of a hit all the time on collecting that extra $100,000. Really, the client is better off to save 100 in most cases than they are to get 100. Is that right?

John Cattie, Jr.:
Very true, very true, Dave. There’s going to be a bigger hit on that extra 100 on the top end than there’s going to be on the bottom end.

David Craig – Host:
I think clients need to focus on both and be talking to their attorneys. That’s true, folks, whether it’s Medicaid, Medicare, whether it’s VA, whether it’s what we call an ERISA plan, regular health insurance plan. All of these are complicated. They have certain contracts that I know John is going to want to look at. He’s going to look at the language.

But this is a thing that you want to be working far ahead, and sometimes, at least I’ve seen in my practice, where our clients get charged for bills that they don’t even really owe. They’re not even right bills. I’ve been in mediation with other lawyers, sitting in a mediation with group where I represent one person, they represent somebody else in the same wreck.

I’m asking them questions about their liens, the attorney, and they have no idea. They just took the piece of paper or whatever the lien holder told them they owed and that was the number they were using. Sometimes, I assume, health insurance companies, lien holders, they get it wrong, don’t they?

John Cattie, Jr.:
Happens all the time, Dave. I can’t tell you how many times where we are asked to assist with resolving a lien on a particular case. It doesn’t matter whether it’s Medicare or Medicaid or an ERISA plan or working with a veteran and they’ve got VA coverage or TRICARE coverage or whatever the case may be.

You get that initial lien letter itemization back from the lien holder, and nine times out of 10 the itemization is going to be wrong, because they’re going to include charges, medical expenses that are not related to the case at all. Here’s an example. All right.

Let’s say that I’m getting called up by that same attorney who represents Jane Doe in that truck crash in North Carolina, and he says, “Listen, Jane Doe is on Medicare and Medicaid. Can you help?” We get the proper documentation in, we send that off to Medicare, and Medicare comes back and says, “Yep. We have paid $242,000 worth of conditional payments of charges on behalf of Jane Doe.”

Well, guess what? Jane Doe’s injuries had to do with lower body, lower extremity injuries, broken bones, et cetera. But included with all these charges are cardiac heart charges that are not related to the truck crash. Well, the lien holder, in this example Medicare, has included those, and if you’re not careful, you’re going to pay back a lien that is too big, because you’re paying on charges that the lien holder has no right to collect on.

It really is important to, line-by-line, be able to understand, yes, this charge is related. This charge is related to the case. This one is related to the case. No, anything related to the heart, that’s not a part of our case. There were no injuries to the heart or anything cardiac related as part of this case, so it’s not appropriate to have to pay back a lien for anything that’s related to the heart. That’s the granular type of work that needs to be done in order for that bottom-line number to be as high as possible.

David Craig – Host:
Are there times where, if you want to challenge a bill and you say, “Okay. This bill, this is not right,” you’re limited in the amount of time you have to challenge that bill?

John Cattie, Jr.:
Yeah. It depends on the circumstances, Dave. Depends on the circumstances. There’s always ability to challenge a bill and to dispute a lien itemization and ask the lien holder to remove certain items. Obviously, if you’re getting around to addressing liens after you’ve settled your case, that becomes more challenging.

Depending on the lien that it is, the fact that the case is settled may cement in place what that number looks like. Depending on the lien that we’re talking about, there may be some opportunities to continue to dispute or to appeal those determinations. But that’s why starting this lien work earlier on in the case is really advantageous for the injury victim.

They need to understand, when they watch this podcast, they need to communicate with their attorney not only about what their expectations are about that top-line number. But, “Hey, how are we going to best handle the liens in my case to get those as low as possible, because that means my bottom-line number is going to be as big as possible.”

David Craig – Host:
Would you agree with me, just like in my world, not every lawyer should be handling a truck wreck case, nor should I be handling a medical malpractice case. My license would allow me to, but you don’t want me to. Would you agree with me that not all lawyers are equal in handling this bottom-line area, the liens and the reductions and the set-asides?

John Cattie, Jr.:
Dave, it’s funny. I think the most valuable thing that anybody on this planet has is time. It’s the one thing that we can’t buy more of, we can’t get back once it’s already passed. I don’t know anybody except in the movies who has built a time machine and been able to travel and turn a 24-hour day into a 36-hour day.

It’s not that other attorneys can’t do this kind of work. A general practitioner can certainly do it, but in order to do it at a level that someone who focuses their practice on it does it takes literally hundreds, tens of thousands of hours in their career to get to such a level of expertise and experience to be able to know what arguments to make, when to make them, who to talk to so that a lien can be resolved in 10 days as opposed to 300 days.

Think about it from this perspective. The money, the dollar difference is important, but the time difference. There’s also something to be said for that because, as an injury victim, you not only want to get your money, you not only want to turn the page on this chapter of your life and move forward.

Doing that as quickly as you can with as much money in your pocket as you can is the perfect scenario. When a lien takes a long time to resolve, you might get to the proper result at the end of the day, but if you could have gotten to that same result in one-tenth of the time, that’s a better result.

David Craig – Host:
I think folks should look at it and say, the goal is, no one person is good at everything, because it’s just we don’t have enough time to study and spend and learn. All the seminars I go to, I either speak at, host, watch, or go to happen to be in my niche.
I think that my goal when I represent somebody is to put together the best team that can help this client make the best recovery. They’ve got one shot. I’m dealing with catastrophically injured folks or wrongful death cases. They’ve got one shot and they deserve the best team. If that means that there happens to be an underwriting issue, and I don’t know underwrite as well as some other lawyer in the country, then I reach out to that underwrite lawyer and say, “Hey, can you help me with part of my case?”

If it’s on lien reductions and preserving assets, then why not put that person on the team that does this day in and day out, 24/7? I think when you are a client, you should be looking for a lawyer who wants to put together the best team.

John Cattie, Jr.:
Dave, what’s the injury victim’s goal after they’ve been catastrophically hurt? Being able to get the best possible result you can. As attorneys who represent those injury victims on the truck crash case or on whatever type of personal injury case there is, one needs to sometimes swallow their pride and understand and respect that ultimate goal of best possible result for the client.

Sometimes that means that you might not be best equipped to handle a certain aspect of your case. To your point, if there’s a blind spot in the team that you have assembled, you want to partner up with, co-counsel with someone who can fill that goal, complete that blind spot.

Liens are one of those areas that, all the time, is a blind spot for most, because most attorneys who work with injury victims, they can struggle through a lien. Or they’ve got someone in the office who they think is pretty good and they devote their time to it, and they might be pretty good on a certain lien, but maybe not as good at other liens.

Whereas someone who is a specialist who focuses their practice on the area day in and day out, doing this literally hundreds of times a week on a variety of cases, fact patterns, and lien holders. Working with, negotiating with, going through that process from start to finish. There’s an advantage to working with someone who is niche and boutique in the world that they work in and really have that experience and expertise in that world.

David Craig – Host:
I think that it can be extraordinary. It’s not only important from a financial standpoint. We want to maximize the amount of money that our clients get, but there’s another part of this that scares the death out of me, and that should scare every attorney, which is whatever you do, you don’t want to jeopardize somebody’s future benefits.

Because if you mess up and somebody loses their Medicaid, and they have to have it, and now they don’t have it and you’ve messed that up by getting them a settlement. They may have been happy as heck when they got that top number, but when they went to go get their medical treatment, they couldn’t get it paid for. Or Medicare, if Medicare doesn’t pay something. A lot of folks are on certain types of benefits, and they may lose those. That is another benefit of working with a firm like yours, is you help preserve those benefits. Talk a little bit about that.

John Cattie, Jr.:
It’s a really sad situation when that comes to pass, because for as little knowledge as an injury victim has about healthcare liens at the start of their case when they’re meeting with their attorney for the first time. As little attention as healthcare liens get, even less attention is given to the conversation that should go like this.

“David, listen, it’s a pleasure to work with you. I’m honored that you decided to allow me to represent you in your case. I’m really looking forward to assisting. Just want to cover a couple things. I know we’ve talked a little bit, but there was one thing that was not covered, and that’s this. That is as we move forward, and hopefully we’re going to get the best result for you that we possibly can. I know that down the road you’re not on Medicare yet, but you may be getting on Medicare in the future. “There’s a possibility that if we don’t take certain steps in your case on your behalf, that if we get a good result here that future access to Medicare might be jeopardized. I wanted to make sure you understood that and you’re going to authorize me to take the steps that I need to take in order to protect your future access to Medicare as part of the representation that I’m providing to you. How’s that sound?”

David Craig – Host:
And, unfortunately, that conversation doesn’t happen that often.

John Cattie, Jr.:
No, it doesn’t. The same conversation needs to happen when the individual is on state Medicaid benefits, which is even more acute, because there’s a difference between Medicare and Medicaid. Those are two separate and distinct insurance programs, and sometimes those get confused by people. All the time. Even attorneys.

The potential is there when you achieve a settlement or a judgment in a case that, unless certain steps have already been taken, an injury victim could lose access to future Medicare and Medicaid. I think walking in the door, meeting with the attorney, that’s one of the things that for sure is not on their radar screen, and it shouldn’t be.

They shouldn’t come in the door with the knowledge of that. That’s on the attorney to advise them of that potential and then ask them if they want to make sure that those benefits are going to be protected, yes or no. Now, sometimes the injury victim client is not going to care about that for whatever reason.

But most of the time when it’s presented to them in that kind of way, yes, obviously I don’t want anything to be done to jeopardize my potential future access to Medicare and Medicaid benefits down the road. Please make sure that you’re taking the proper steps to protect those for me as we go on in my case and as we move it towards settlement.

David Craig – Host:
At the very least, I believe people need to have the information. I represent the clients; clients make decisions all the time. Clients make a decision whether to settle. Clients make a decision with me whether to go to trial. But unfortunately, if they don’t have the information, they can’t be expected to make the right decision.

I get clients that don’t understand the difference. They may be on SSI when they think they’re on SSD. They don’t know that there’s a difference and they come to me and say, “Oh, what do you mean I might lose my benefits?” I think that’s a really good point is that on the front end, because most people, again, when they come in, their life is turned upside down.

It’s chaos. They’re focused on, “Who’s responsible, and how are they going to pay me?” They’re not thinking anything at all about future medical, future health insurance, future benefits. I think having that conversation and providing that information to people would be extraordinarily helpful.

John Cattie, Jr.:
Dave, attorneys should not expect injury victims to be thinking in that kind of way. That’s unfair and inappropriate for them to assume that they understand that on the front end. It’s incumbent on the attorney who’s representing that individual to have that conversation on the front end of the case.

David Craig – Host:
I recently had a case where a client went to… It was a policy limits case, and so there were hundreds of thousands of dollars involved and it was going to be a sure limits case. The person had a lawyer. They went to this lawyer and the lawyer is a known trial lawyer.

Goes to this known trial lawyer and the lawyer says, “Well, I can probably get you limits.” The person said, “Well, what about my benefits?” They had income-sensitive benefits, and the lawyer said, “Well, it could mess those up.” They said, “Well, what do you mean?”

The lawyer said, “Well, I don’t do that. I’m just going to go get you the money and I’m going to give it to you, and then you figure that out.” This client was like, “Well, I don’t know how to figure that out.” The lawyer called my office. He goes, “Well, I either just get you the money and give it to you or you find yourself another lawyer.”

The person called me. I actually called the lawyer and said, “Hey, look, we can help you walk through this process. There’s no reason for you to not take it.” The guy was like, “I don’t have any interest in it.” This lawyer didn’t even want to know. He would rather not help the client, not get a fee. We put it in place and protected the client’s assets. If the client had done that, if the lawyer had just collected the money and gave it to the client, the client would have immediately lost some of their benefits.

John Cattie, Jr.:
Absolutely true.

David Craig – Host:
Some of these folks cannot afford to lose their benefits. They have needs that are monthly, and they have health insurance needs. They’re on Medicaid, and they cannot afford to lose that coverage. The sad thing is, working with the right people like yourself, there are ways around that. You don’t have to lose your benefits.

John Cattie, Jr.:
Whether the individual realizes it or not, or whether you and I realize it or not, we tend to take our healthcare insurance for granted in certain ways. We just assume that it’s there and we don’t give enough thought to what needs to be done to make sure that our access to that remains uninterrupted or proceeds in the way that we want it to proceed.

Because there will be some situations where someone is on Medicaid or income-sensitive benefits that may end up resolving a truck crash case for $6 million. The tools that may be utilized to preserve that future access to Medicaid might not be a great fit for what the goals of that individual are.

They might be too restrictive and they might say, “I don’t care about preserving my future access to Medicaid benefits. I’m okay giving those up. I will proceed in a different way because of the result that you’re getting for me.” But you know what?That’s a conversation that needs to be had. It should never be assumed.

Just for any attorneys out there who are watching this podcast, don’t feel as though you can’t accept the case and provide assistance to an injury victim simply because of a lien issue. About 10 years ago, there was a lot of back and forth in my world about whether Medicare was going to do this, that, or the other.

It really caused a fuss with some attorneys who ended up saying, “You know what? This stuff is so uncertain. I’m just not going to take on any cases involving Medicare beneficiaries, because I don’t want to run the risk of anything.” I think what we’re here saying is that, you know what, there are conversations that should be had between the injury victim client and their attorney to be clear about how to proceed.

Not only on the lien side of things, but also on the benefit preservation side of things, so that there is clarity with how things are going to roll out. If the client does not want certain things to happen, well, that’s the client’s prerogative, but the attorney should never assume that something should be done or should not be done. They ought to always understand that there needs to be some due diligence and conversations had to be clear about what should happen.

David Craig – Host:
Well, I’d like to give some people some guidance. I’ve done this on some other podcasts and it’s always funny, because I’ve actually had clients walk in and ask me these questions and say, “Well, you think that you should be asked this, so let me ask you.”

I love it, because information is power. It gives people the power to make the right decisions. If you’re in a catastrophic accident where you’ve lost a loved one, you shouldn’t feel forced, you shouldn’t feel coerced into picking a lawyer. You should take your time and interview and make sure you’re picking the right person.

I like to give them guidance on how to go about doing that. John, if you were advising somebody that was looking for a lawyer, what questions would you have them ask their lawyer to kind of figure out whether or not their liens are going to be reduced and taken care of properly, and whether or not going their benefits are going to be preserved?

John Cattie, Jr.:
Dave, great question. Some of the questions that immediately popped in my mind are, how does your office handle healthcare liens? Do you have attorneys in-house who are doing that? Are you going to do that for me personally? Is your paralegal going to do that? Do you outsource that to somebody else? Who else is doing that for you?

If it’s not you or someone within your firm who’s doing that for me, then who else is doing it? Are they attorneys doing it or are they non-attorneys that are doing that kind of work? If you do outsource that work, how long have you worked with them? What has been your experience? What’s been their success rate? I’m on Medicare, so what’s been their success rate in resolving a Medicare lien?

Questions like that to get a real sense and understanding about the process of it internally at the firm and the way they handle it, because the response to those questions is going to tell the injured victim a whole lot about how much that attorney cares about that bottom-line number.

David Craig – Host:
I think those are great questions, and hopefully people will just start walking in and asking me those questions and anybody else that they’re considering hiring. One of the things clients are always concerned about is fees. “How am I going to afford to pay this?”

Unfortunately, a lot of folks, the trucking industry and the insurance industry, especially in the trucking world, they can afford to hire the best attorneys. There are attorneys that do nothing but transportation law, and I’m against the same ones all over the country, and they have great experts.

They’re going to hire the best experts that do trucking investigations, reconstruction, download. The trucking industry, especially in that area, they can spend the money to do it right. Our clients typically don’t have that kind of money, so they can’t afford to pay an hourly rate that the same defense lawyers would charge.

The great thing about me and other lawyers who do this work is we work on a contingency fee. We never make people pay us upfront any money. They don’t have to go in their pockets to get the best reconstructionist. I hire and put together a team of the best people for each type of case. People might be listening to this. “Oh, my God. Do I have to pay two lawyers or two law firms? Do I have to put money out to talk to you upfront about my benefits?”

Talk a little bit about how you typically work with other law firms.

John Cattie, Jr.:
Yeah, absolutely. Very similar to yourself and your firm and other personal injury attorneys, the majority of the lien work that we do, we also do on a contingent-fee basis. We don’t bill by the hour for most of the work that we do. The results speak for themselves.

If we’re able to get a result, then our fee is a piece of the savings that we’re able to achieve. If we’re not able to get a result, which happens sometimes… I’ll put that out there; not every case is a winning case. We all have cases that are challenging and we’re not able to get a result. On those cases we don’t take a fee.

Nothing upfront for someone to talk to us. We don’t start the clock, so to speak. Happy to consult with anybody initially to determine, “Hey, is there a way that we can help? If there is, then here’s how we’re going to get started and this is what the billing is going to look like. If you guys are in agreement with that, then provide us with this information. We’ll open our file and we’ll get to work and we will invoice you at the end of the case when our work is completed.”

David Craig – Host:
It’s very similar, so people don’t have to be scared or afraid to reach out and have their lawyers work with someone else like yourself, because they don’t get paid until the end. Then, it’s just like I talked about before. If you get $100,000 at the top and you take out fees, but you pay that $100,000 on the bottom without negotiating, then you’re losing. You want somebody negotiating that bottom number, those liens, making sure that they’re reduced, that you’re only paying what you owe, and that you’re paying the least amount that you legally are obligated to pay.

John Cattie, Jr.:
Dave, here’s an example. I’ll choose. We’ll do Medicare. We’ve been talking about Medicare a little bit. Let me choose Medicare here as an example. You speak to working on that bottom number to try to bring that up. It’s commonly understood that Medicare is willing to reduce to account for the efforts of the personal injury attorney representing the truck crash victim.
There is something that’s coming as an offset there. Typically, it’s between a third and maybe 40% off the top. A lot of attorneys seem to be okay with that as the reduction, and they don’t push any further, thinking that their job is done. They’re checking a box. “The lien is done, and now we can go ahead and disburse, and the client is going to be happy, because we’re getting the money disbursed.”

But my firm has an average Medicare lien reduction of 84% in the personal injury context. Meaning that if the Medicare lien is starting out at $100,000, we’re typically, on average, getting it down to a final number that has to get paid back to Medicare, totaling $16,000. That’s real money to that truck crash victim at the end of the day, making that bottom-line number even higher.

Again, it’s not to say that the attorneys who are representing the truck crash victims can’t get that type of result. But it is a matter of how much time you have and experience that you have and what’s going into it and knowing how exactly to do it to be able to get those types of results.

David Craig – Host:
I would say the same thing is true. You develop relationships with different companies as well. You do it day in and day out. You earn respect from people, because they know you know the area. Certainly you’re capable of negotiating and handling a semi wreck case.

But I would tell you maybe you want me to do it for you because of the fact that I have the respect. I try these cases. I deal with these issues. I know this area. But the same goes true with you, and I think that’s what people need to realize is that there’s very rarely one person that just does it all.

I love that. I love that being actually able to know, here’s the reduction our company gets. How are you guys doing? I’m happy to take my results and my niche up against anybody’s, but I like working with people who are willing to take their results and say, “Hey, look, I’m willing to compare mine to anybody.” That’s another great question. I ask people, “How successful are you? How successful are you reducing these liens?”

John Cattie, Jr.:
I will put our numbers up against anybody in the country doing it, whether you’re a law firm that does this kind of work, whether you’re a company that does this kind of work, or any personal injury firm that represents the injury victim on the underlying personal injury claim. I’m so proud of the numbers and the results that we get and the team that we have doing it.
I shared with you that with Medicare, we average 84% reductions. For those folks who are not on traditional Medicare, but may have a Medicare Advantage plan, like from Humana or UnitedHealthcare or Aetna or something like that that they purchased. In fact, as we’re doing this today, the open enrollment period is starting, so many folks that may be watching this may be considering moving off of traditional Medicare and buying into a Medicare Advantage plan.

Well, we have an average lien reduction there of 73%, and that’s not on one case. That’s on an average of every single case that our firm has worked in our firm’s history. For state Medicaid cases across the board, average of 63% reductions. ERISA liens for employer-based healthcare plans, we average 64% reductions.

Then when it comes to military liens for veterans and family members with the Veterans Administration, the VA, we average 94% reductions. For TRICARE, we average 87%. I will put those up against anybody in the country, and I’m very competitive about it, Dave. If there’s an area that we’re dragging compared to anybody else that does this kind of work, understand that I will be redoubling efforts internally to push that and get that number where it needs to be.

David Craig – Host:
Well, I really appreciate it. Every case is different, but the great thing about it is, if you’ve done enough of this, whatever your niche is and you’re good at it, you should be willing to discuss your results. I tell people that they should interview lawyers.
Whether it’s a personal injury lawyer, you should ask them, “Have you handled a case similar to mine? Have you taken a case to trial?” It’s amazing to me, there’s a lot of lawyers out there that are trial lawyers that have never taken a case to trial, nor has their firm.

There is a difference. You should ask those questions, and you should ask specifics on liens and how do you do it? How well are you? And I think that by doing that, usually there’s somebody in the family who’s looking out for them. If you’re that person, then go with your family and ask those tough questions.

This is the biggest decision you’re going to make is what team am I putting together to protect my family? I don’t care if it’s me and John, but by God, it should be somebody who knows and can answer those questions and can handle and protect your family.

John Cattie, Jr.:
It’s such an important decision to be made. It’s one that should not be done off the hip. It shouldn’t feel rushed or forced or quick to come. It’s something that needs to be considered with real thought, and there needs to be a level of comfort. Injury victims should not only ask about results in other similar cases, but do you have any testimonials from anybody?
What has been the experience? I want to hear from other people how they have felt about working with you in the past. What have they said about that experience? Because the results are one thing, but the client experience, to me, is even more important than the results at the end of the day.

Because if one is treating someone well with care and dignity, it’s going to be returned and it’s going to be as enjoyable of an experience as it possibly can. Whether we’re talking about a truck crash case, and you’re doing the work that you do with some of the most severely catastrophically injured people in those cases.

Or whether we’re talking about having to go back and forth with an ERISA plan saying that they’re self-funded and they’re not going to reduce a lien or anything like that. The client experience is more important than the results, but when you focus on the client experience, in my experience, the results come naturally.

David Craig – Host:
No. I agree with you. Recently, it was a really tragic truck wreck case. Somebody that was making the decisions for the family called me and said they had narrowed it down. They’d done their homework, they had narrowed it down to three lawyers, and they said, “I’m trying to figure out which of the three.”

I said, “Well, I think first of all, it’s fantastic that you’ve done some research. It’s fantastic that you’re interviewing us.” They go, “Do you want to know who the others are?” I said, “No.” I said, “I don’t need to know who they are.” I said, “What questions can I answer for you?”

They asked me questions, and at the end they said, “Well, why should we pick you?” I said, “Well, I tell you what. If you pick me, I will be very appreciative of the fact that I get to work for you and your family. When you interview these other two lawyers, ask do you feel the same way, or do they make you feel like you should be fortunate, you’re fortunate to pick them?”
It’s a very subtle difference whether they believe that you’re fortunate to pick them or they’re fortunate to have the chance to work for you. I believe honestly that I love working for people. My son is a lawyer here, my daughter is a lawyer, my wife is involved in my practice.

I get up every morning. I’m excited about it. I have pictures on my desk of the people who I’m working for, and it never gets old. I do think you’re absolutely right. The client experience. These kind of cases, you’re spending sometimes a few years with somebody, and it has to be people who you believe care, who are going to take your phone calls, who are going to meet with you, who are going to talk to you in the evenings and the weekends.

At least that’s important to me. I think you really need that, and you need somebody who says, “Okay. I need this expert. Maybe I need a lawyer to help me here. I need a lawyer to help me there.” Then their ego is not so big that they feel like they can do everything, because it’s getting harder and harder to do everything.

John Cattie, Jr.:
One can do everything, Dave, but they can’t do it nearly as well as someone who recognizes the weaknesses or blind spots that they have, and they look to the outside to bolster those, because they understand that it’s all about getting the best possible result for the client.

David Craig – Host:
Yep. Absolutely. Well, John, thank you so much. I really appreciate you being a guest on our After the Crash podcast. How do people get ahold of you? If there’s lawyers listening to this or clients that are concerned about these matters, how does somebody get ahold of you?

John Cattie, Jr.:
Absolutely, Dave. Our firm’s website, we’re Cattie & Gonzales. The firm website is www.CattieLaw.com. That’s C-A-T-T-I-E-L-A-W dot com. For folks that want to send me a personal email, my email address is J Cattie, C-A-T-T-I-E, at CattieLaw.com. Always happy to jump on a call, talk with anybody about these issues, and try to point people in the right direction. If we at the end of the day can assist, it’s what we’re here to do.

David Craig – Host:
This is David Craig, and you’ve been listening to After the Crash. If you’d like more information about me or my law firm, please go to our website, CKFLaw.com. Or if you’d like to talk to me, you can call 1-800-ASK-DAVID. If you would like a guide on what to do after a truck wreck, then pick up my book, Semitruck Wreck: A Guide for Victims and Their Families, which is available on Amazon, or you can download it for free on our website, CKFLaw.com.