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Los Angeles Rideshare Accident Attorneys
Rideshare crashes can involve different insurance depending on whether the driver was offline, waiting for a request, heading to a pickup, or carrying a passenger. The Law Offices of Burg & Brock investigate the driver’s app status, who was at fault, which policies apply, and the full impact of the injuries.
No fee unless we recover for you.
Cameron Yadidi Brock
Prior results do not guarantee a similar outcome.
Reviewed by Cameron Yadidi BrockFounding Attorney, Law Offices of Burg & Brock · California State Bar #183112 · Admitted 1996
The Short Answer
You may have a claim. What it looks like depends less on the crash itself than on two things: who caused it, and what the rideshare driver’s app was doing at the moment of impact.
Those two answers decide which insurance is in play, and rideshare insurance works differently from ordinary car insurance. A driver logged out of the app is on their personal policy. A driver waiting for a request sits under one set of protection. A driver who has accepted a ride, or has a passenger aboard, sits under a much larger commercial policy.
You are not expected to know which of those applied. Establishing it is our job, and it is usually the first thing we do. What matters on your side is getting treated, keeping the ride receipt, and not giving a recorded statement before you understand who is asking.
Start Here
The answer changes which insurance matters and what has to be proved. Find yourself below.
Situation One
Passenger
“I was riding in the Uber or Lyft when the crash happened.”
You were not controlling either vehicle, so fault almost never lands on you. An active trip generally places the driver in the highest coverage period. The question becomes whether your driver or another motorist caused it, and which policy responds.
Covered in detail below under passenger claims.
Situation Two
Rideshare Driver
“I was driving for Uber or Lyft when I was injured.”
Your own injury claim is a different question from the liability cover that protects other people from you. It usually runs through the at-fault driver’s insurance, applicable uninsured or underinsured motorist cover, and benefits that may be available to drivers.
Covered in detail below under injured driver claims.
Situation Three
Third Party
“An Uber or Lyft driver hit me, my vehicle, or injured me outside the rideshare car.”
Whether you were in another car, on foot, on a bike or on a motorcycle, the pivotal fact is the same: what the rideshare driver’s app was doing when they hit you. That single detail can change the available cover enormously.
Covered in detail below under third-party claims.
The Difference
Not because the collision is different. Because the insurance architecture behind it is.
The same driver, in the same car, on the same street, can sit under three completely different insurance arrangements depending on what the app was doing.
A personal auto policy, a transportation network company policy, another motorist’s insurance and your own cover can all matter in a single crash.
Fault is often shared. Another driver, a vehicle owner, an employer or a public entity can each carry part of it.
Trip data, timestamps and in-app communications can establish what an ordinary crash would never need to prove.
Passenger, rideshare driver and third party each face a different coverage analysis from the same collision.
Older versions of this page said rideshare drivers carry a million dollars in liability that benefits the drivers themselves. That is wrong, and it has been removed. Liability insurance responds to claims made against the insured driver by people they injured. A rideshare driver’s own injuries are a separate question with separate answers, and they are covered further down this page.
Insurance & App
Four states, four different answers. This is the single most useful thing to understand about a rideshare claim.
Not logged into the platform. The driver’s own personal auto policy is generally the starting point, the same as any other motorist.
California private auto minimums
Logged in and available, with no request accepted. California requires transportation network company liability protection at this stage, plus applicable excess protection.
Minimum TNC liability, plus excess
The driver has accepted a request and is travelling to collect the passenger. The commercial policy is now primary.
From pickup until the trip ends. The same primary commercial liability applies throughout the ride.
These figures describe liability insurance requirements. They do not determine what an individual injury claim is worth. A one million dollar policy is a ceiling on what that policy can pay, not a valuation of your case, and not a number anyone can promise you.
This is where a lot of published information is now out of date. California rideshare insurance rules changed in 2026, and older articles still repeat a single universal figure for uninsured and underinsured motorist cover on every trip. We are not going to restate a number that may no longer apply to your crash.
What is accurate: the uninsured and underinsured motorist protection available after a rideshare collision depends on the platform, the specific policy, and the law in effect on the date of the crash. Uber’s arrangements are not automatically Lyft’s. Establishing what actually applied on your date is part of the work.
Established from trip data, receipts, timestamps and the driver’s own account.
Offline, waiting, en route or on trip.
Personal policy, TNC protection, commercial policy, or a combination.
Who caused it, and whether you were a passenger, the driver, or someone outside the vehicle.
Which policy or policies a claim can realistically be presented to.
App status is the starting point, not the whole answer. Two crashes in the same period can still resolve differently depending on fault, the injuries, how many people were hurt, what other policies exist and whether the platform’s insurer accepts the period at all. Anyone presenting app status as the single switch that settles coverage is oversimplifying it.
Liability
Often more than one party, and finding the second one can matter more than proving the first.
The most common defendant. Which policy answers for them depends on the period they were in.
Frequently the actual cause. A passenger’s claim often runs against the other driver, not their own.
Where the rideshare driver does not own the car, the owner’s policy can also apply.
If another vehicle involved was being driven for work, that employer may share responsibility.
When a component fails, whether brakes, tires or a restraint system, the claim can extend to who built or sold it.
Dangerous road design or an unmaintained signal can put a public entity in the case. These run on much shorter deadlines.
The rideshare company’s insurance can be highly relevant without Uber or Lyft themselves being directly legally responsible for the collision. Those are two different questions. Whether the platform carries direct liability in a particular case is fact-specific, and anyone telling you that you can simply sue Uber is skipping the analysis rather than doing it.
Claimant Type One
Passengers are in the strongest position of anyone involved, because a passenger was not controlling either vehicle. Fault is a question about the drivers, not about you.
An active trip with a passenger aboard generally places the rideshare driver in the highest coverage period. From there the work is establishing which driver caused the crash, because that decides whose insurance answers. If your own driver caused it, the commercial policy is normally the route. If another motorist caused it, the claim usually runs against them first, with other cover examined where their insurance is insufficient or absent.
The single most useful thing you can do is keep the ride receipt and the trip record in the app. It timestamps the journey and identifies the driver and vehicle, which is exactly what has to be established later.
Claimant Type Two
This is the situation most commonly misdescribed online, including on the previous version of this page.
The large commercial liability policy attached to your trip exists to answer claims made against you by people you injure. It is not a fund for your own injuries. Your claim is a different exercise, and it usually looks at the at-fault driver’s liability insurance first, then at uninsured or underinsured motorist protection where that driver has none or too little, then at any occupational accident benefits available to drivers on the platform, and at your own applicable cover.
There is also a loss that other claimants do not have: the income you cannot earn while you are off the road. That is documentable, and it should be part of the claim rather than an afterthought.
A one million dollar liability policy does not automatically compensate the rideshare driver’s own injuries. Any page telling you otherwise is describing liability cover as though it were first-party cover. They are not the same thing.
Claimant Type Three
This covers anyone outside the rideshare vehicle: another motorist, a passenger in another car, someone on foot, on a bicycle, or on a motorcycle.
The pivotal fact is what the rideshare driver’s app was doing at the moment they hit you. Logged out, and you are dealing with an ordinary personal auto policy and its minimums. Logged in and waiting, and transportation network company protection may apply. Ride accepted or passenger aboard, and the one million dollar primary commercial policy is in play. Same collision, same injuries, very different picture depending on a detail you had no way of seeing.
Pedestrians and cyclists tend to be seriously hurt in these collisions, and a driver watching for a pickup is a recognised risk at the kerbside. If you were on a motorcycle, our motorcycle accident page covers the issues specific to those claims.
You cannot establish it yourself, and you are not expected to. It comes out of trip data, the driver’s account and platform records once a claim is properly presented.
Several sources, used together rather than relied on individually.
From the Scene
From the Platform
From Elsewhere
Platform records are confidential and are obtained through the claim process, not by an injured person emailing the app. Nobody should delay calling because they cannot get trip data. Keep what you have, and let the rest be pursued properly.
Common Scenarios
The pattern matters because it changes what evidence is worth chasing.
The most distinctly rideshare collision there is. A driver stopping abruptly for a pin, pulling across a lane, or opening a door into traffic. Trip data usually establishes exactly where the pickup was meant to be.
A driver taking a request, following turn-by-turn directions or reading a message. The app itself becomes part of the evidence rather than just the context.
Left turns and signal disputes, often at the moment a driver is looking for an address rather than the road.
LAX and the surrounding hotel corridor generate constant airport runs. Downtown, Hollywood and the Westside produce dense late-night pickup traffic where drivers stop wherever the pin lands. The 405, the 101 and the 10 put those same vehicles into heavy freeway traffic between fares. None of that is scene-setting: it is why kerbside and lane-change collisions dominate rideshare claims in this city, and why the pickup location recorded in the app is often worth more than the police diagram.
Compensation
The categories are the same as any injury claim. What differs is which policy they are presented to.
Serious Injuries
With life-care planning and treating physicians rather than a stack of bills.
Evidence
Rideshare data can help establish the driver’s status at the time of impact. It is not automatically available to anyone who asks, which is why preserving what you do hold matters.
Rideshare & App
Crash Evidence
Injury & Loss
After a Rideshare Crash
Same day where possible. Adrenaline hides injuries.
Where appropriate. A report is easier to obtain than to reconstruct.
Vehicles, plates, positions, road, and visible injuries.
Screenshot the trip and the receipt before anything is deleted.
Names and numbers now beat memories later.
Any in-app communication about the trip or the crash.
Medical, wage and repair documents as they arrive.
The appropriate ones, with facts rather than speculation about fault.
An early offer reflects what is known early, which is usually the least.
Particularly before any recorded statement or signed release.
Before you sign or say anything
Know who is asking first.
Platforms and insurers are not villains, and treating them as though they were does not help anyone. They are organisations with a process, and that process is not built around your interests.
Before a recorded statement, a broad medical authorisation, a final release or any meaningful settlement, four things are worth understanding: who is contacting you, whose interests they represent, what the document actually does, and whether advice would change what you sign. A release is final. That is the point of it.
Our Process
Rideshare claims take one extra step at the front that ordinary car crashes do not.
Passenger, rideshare driver or third party. This decides everything downstream.
Offline, waiting, accepted ride or active trip at the moment of impact.
Crash evidence and platform records, before either becomes harder to obtain.
Every responsible party, not just the obvious one.
Personal, TNC, commercial, other motorists, and your own.
Medical, earnings and property, current and future.
A demand built on documents and records rather than adjectives.
Filing suit where the offer does not reflect the evidence.
Deadlines
Many California personal injury lawsuits generally must be filed within two years of the injury.
*Government-related claims and other situations can involve shorter or different deadlines. A claim involving a public entity generally has a much shorter window. Rideshare claims can also involve several insurers with their own reporting expectations, which is a separate matter from the filing deadline. Ask early rather than assuming you have two years.
There is no calculator for this, and the size of the policy is not the answer. These are the factors that actually move it.
The Attorney Responsible for This Page
Cameron Yadidi Brock has been licensed to practice law in California since June 1996 and founded the Law Offices of Burg & Brock in Sherman Oaks. He practices personal injury law and represents people injured in motor vehicle collisions, including rideshare crashes, and in other serious-injury matters.
Not a general practice that also takes injury cases when they arrive.
Admitted to the California Bar in June 1996, verifiable on the State Bar’s own record.
No fee unless there is a recovery, set out in writing before anything is signed.
Files built so suit can be filed when an offer does not reflect the evidence.
Questions
The collision is the same. The insurance is not. An ordinary crash usually involves two personal auto policies. A rideshare crash can involve a personal policy, transportation network company protection, a commercial policy, another motorist’s insurer and your own cover, and which of those applies turns on what the driver’s app was doing.
That is Period 1. California requires transportation network company liability protection at that stage, together with applicable excess protection. It is a lower level than once a ride has been accepted, which is exactly why establishing the period matters.
From acceptance through to the end of the trip, a one million dollar primary commercial liability policy applies. That covers both the drive to the pickup and the ride itself.
You were not controlling either vehicle, so fault is a question about the drivers rather than about you. An active trip generally places your driver in the highest coverage period. The work is establishing which driver caused the crash, because that decides whose insurance answers first.
Your own injury claim is a different question from the liability policy attached to your trip. It typically looks at the at-fault driver’s insurance, then uninsured or underinsured motorist protection, then any occupational accident benefits available to drivers, along with your lost driving income.
The first question is what their app was doing. Logged out puts you against an ordinary personal policy. Logged in and waiting brings transportation network company protection into play. Ride accepted or passenger aboard brings the commercial policy in.
The same app-status analysis applies, and pedestrians and cyclists tend to be more seriously hurt. Kerbside pickups and drop-offs are a recognised risk point, and the pickup location recorded in the app can be directly relevant.
No. A policy limit is a ceiling on what that policy can pay. It says nothing about what any individual claim is worth. Case value comes from the injuries, the treatment, the losses and the evidence, and anyone quoting you a number from the policy size rather than the medical records is guessing.
Uninsured and underinsured motorist protection is the route worth examining. What is available after a rideshare crash depends on the platform, the specific policy and the law in effect on the date of the collision, so it is established case by case rather than assumed.
Sometimes, but not automatically, and not as a general rule. The platform’s insurance being relevant is a different question from the platform itself being directly legally responsible for a driver’s conduct. That is fact-specific and has to be assessed on the particular case.
From several sources together: the police report, what the driver said at the scene, whether a passenger was present, trip information and timestamps, in-app communications, the ride receipt, and video where it exists. Not from any one of them alone.
Yes, and it is common. California divides fault by share, so several parties can each carry part of it, and identifying the second responsible party often matters more than proving the first.
Many California personal injury lawsuits generally must be filed within two years of the injury, but government-related claims and other situations can involve shorter or different deadlines. Ask early rather than assuming.
We work on a contingency fee. There is no fee unless there is a recovery, and the percentage and costs are set out in the written agreement before anything is signed.
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No fee unless we recover for you.
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