You were in an Uber on Olympic, or a Lyft driver came through an intersection in Koreatown, and nobody at the scene wrote anything down. No officer attended. The driver said their company would “take care of it.” Two weeks later you have a hospital bill and no document that says the crash happened.
That is normal in Los Angeles, and in a rideshare case it matters more than it does anywhere else. The Los Angeles Police Department’s own training material states that no report is required where a collision produced vehicle damage only, with no injury and no complained-of pain. So most crashes here generate nothing. In an ordinary claim the fallback is the other driver’s insurer. In a rideshare claim the fallback is the trip record, and that sits on a server belonging to the company whose policy you are claiming against.
Culver Legal has recovered $200 Million and counting for injured people in California. We work on contingency, we advance the costs of the case, and there is no fee unless we win. If there is no recovery, you are not charged those costs either. Call (310) 600-7881 at any hour, including tonight.
Say You Are in Pain, Even If You Think You Are Fine
This is the most useful sentence on the page and it takes ten seconds to act on.
Pain that you report at the scene moves the collision out of the “damage only” category and into the one that requires a written report. Not a fracture, not an ambulance, not a hospital admission. Reported pain. People routinely tell an officer they are fine because adrenaline is doing its job, and the injury surfaces two days later with no document behind it.
The same instinct costs people the rideshare record. A passenger who steps out of a damaged car, orders another ride and goes home has usually not screenshotted anything, and the trip that proves which insurance applies is now a row in somebody else’s database.
Before you do anything else, screenshot your trip. The receipt, the driver’s name and plate, the pickup and drop-off times, the route map. It is in your app history right now and it is the fastest proof in existence of what the driver was doing when they hit something.
Which Uber or Lyft Insurance Applies
California ties the available insurance to what the driver’s app was doing, not to who was at fault. The amounts below are the minimums set by Public Utilities Code 5433, as amended effective January 1, 2026.
| What the driver’s app was doing | Insurance the law requires |
|---|---|
| App off | No rideshare company policy. The driver’s own personal auto policy only |
| App on, waiting for a request, or after a drop-off | $50,000 per person, $100,000 per incident and $30,000 property damage, plus $200,000 excess |
| Request accepted, until the trip ends | $1,000,000 for death, personal injury and property damage |
| You were the passenger, from getting in to getting out | In addition, $60,000 per person and $300,000 per incident of uninsured and underinsured motorist coverage |
These are the amounts the law requires, not a limit on what a company can owe. Which row applies turns on a timestamp nobody at the scene wrote down, which is why the trip record matters so much. What happens between phases is covered in how rideshare coverage works in California.
Did an officer actually attend your crash?
In Los Angeles, most rideshare collisions produce no report at all. That does not end your claim, and we can tell you what replaces it.
You Do Not Have to Have Been the Passenger
The coverage is not restricted to people who booked the ride, and this is where Angelenos most often rule themselves out.
Another driver, hit by a rideshare vehicle, frequently with no idea the other driver was working. The claim runs like any other car accident claim on fault, and on the phase rule for money.
Somebody on foot. A rideshare vehicle stopping, pulling out of a lane or double-parking to collect a passenger is a recognizable Los Angeles hazard, and the rules on yielding to somebody on foot decide fault before any phase question arises.
A cyclist, doored by a passenger getting out or squeezed by a driver pulling to the curb. The duty to look before opening a door sits with the person opening it rather than with the rider beside it.
A motorcycle rider, where the same impact produces a far worse injury and a faster attempt to blame the rider.
The rideshare driver, hurt by another motorist while working. Being treated as a contractor does not remove your right to claim against whoever hit you, and if you were driving for a living there is a work injury question about lost earning capacity that a quick settlement will not cover.
What Los Angeles Adds to the Case
A public entity is in the story more often than people expect. A city vehicle, a bus, a transit operator, or a road defect that contributed puts a public defendant on the other side, and Government Code 911.2 requires a written claim within six months rather than two years. A crash involving a bus and a rideshare vehicle is two claims on two different clocks, because a public transit operator runs on six months.
Camera coverage is unusually good and unusually short-lived. Storefronts, parking structures, building lobbies and doorbell cameras cover a great deal of this city, and almost all of it is overwritten on a loop measured in days. Where no police report exists, that footage is frequently the only independent account of what happened, and nobody will preserve it unless somebody asks in writing.
Head injuries go unrecorded here more than elsewhere, for the same reason the reports do not get written: nobody was assessed at the scene. Somebody who has not been themselves since a crash has a brain injury question, and a clear scan taken later answers the emergency question rather than that one. Where a crash is fatal, California restricts who may bring a wrongful death claim and sets separate rules for the estate.
Which Court Will Hear My Los Angeles Case?
The court covering the place where the crash happened, not the one nearest your home and not wherever the rideshare company is based.
Los Angeles County handles this differently from most of California, and it is set out in a standing order of the court. General Order 2024-GEN-003-00, filed 17 May 2024, records that since 10 October 2022 every newly filed personal injury case is filed in the judicial district where the incident arose.
The court is also retiring its Personal Injury Hub in favor of Independent Calendar courtrooms, where one judge manages the case throughout. Since 8 January 2024 personal injury cases in the Central District have been assigned to IC departments at the Stanley Mosk Courthouse, and hub departments have been closing into new IC courtrooms as that proceeds, Department 30 into Department T at the Alhambra Courthouse and Department 31 into Department B at the Van Nuys Courthouse.
That does not change whether you have a claim. It changes where it is filed and who manages it, and filing in the wrong district spends time a two-year deadline does not give back.
Where You Are Taken Matters, and in Los Angeles It Varies
Los Angeles County has fifteen designated trauma centers, and which one receives you depends on where the incident happened rather than on where you live.
Verified against the California EMS Authority’s designated and ACS-verified trauma center list, the Level I centers in and around the city are Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, Los Angeles General Medical Center, Ronald Reagan UCLA Medical Center, Harbor-UCLA Medical Center, and Children’s Hospital Los Angeles for children. Level II centers including California Hospital Medical Center, Northridge, Providence Holy Cross, St. Francis and Huntington Memorial cover the rest of the county.
Why that belongs in a legal claim rather than a medical one. The records that prove the injury sit with whichever facility received you, and across a county this size that is frequently not the hospital nearest home. A serious injury also generates records at more than one facility as somebody is transferred, and gathering all of them rather than the first set to arrive is a large part of what an early demand gets wrong.
Can You Sue Uber or Lyft After a Los Angeles Crash?
You can bring a claim against the insurance the company is required to carry, and in most cases that is what matters rather than whether the company itself is a named defendant.
Rideshare drivers are engaged as independent contractors, which the companies rely on to resist being sued directly for a driver’s negligence. It changes less than it sounds. California requires a rideshare company to carry insurance on the trip itself, and how much is available turns on what the driver’s app was doing at the moment of the crash rather than on the contractor question.
So the practical answer to “can I sue Uber” is that you claim against the policy Uber is obliged to carry, the driver, and anyone else at fault. The phase rule decides the size of that policy, and it is set out in how rideshare coverage works in California.
The same analysis applies to Lyft. The two companies operate under the same California statute and the same three coverage phases.
How Long Do I Have to File?
Two years from the date of injury, under Code of Civil Procedure 335.1.
Six months to present a written claim to a public entity, under Government Code 911.2, before any lawsuit against it is possible.
Injured children. Code of Civil Procedure 352 pauses the ordinary limitation period while an injured person is under 18. The six-month government claim rule is not paused in the same way.
None of those is the deadline that bites first. The trip data, the camera footage and the witnesses all have their own timetables, none of them written into a statute, and all of them shorter than two years.
Is the trip still in your app history?
Screenshot it today, before anything else. Your own receipt is the fastest proof of which policy applies.
What does it cost, and what comes out of a settlement? Nothing up front. There is no fee unless we win. Out of a settlement come the fee, the case costs advanced, and any medical liens, which is why the headline figure and the amount received are different numbers. The full breakdown is in how rideshare coverage works in California.
Why Los Angeles Clients Choose Culver Legal
We come to you. If you are in the hospital, at home and unable to drive, or cannot get across this city on a weekday, we will meet you where you are. Nobody should have to reach Wilshire Boulevard to start a claim.
Our team speaks Spanish, Farsi, Filipino, Hindi, Mandarin and Korean. Explaining your own accident in your own words is not a convenience.
The economics are simple. The firm works on contingency and advances the costs of the case, so there is nothing to pay up front and no fee unless we win. We advance the case costs, and if there is no recovery you are not charged those costs either. Culver Legal has recovered $200 Million and counting, and answers the phone 24 hours a day.
Los Angeles Rideshare Accident FAQs
No police came to my rideshare crash. Do I still have a claim?
Yes, and it is the normal situation here. The Los Angeles Police Department does not write a report where there was vehicle damage only with no injury and no complained-of pain, so a missing report is common rather than a sign of a weak case. In a rideshare claim the trip record does most of the work the report would have done, and it can be obtained.
How much insurance is available after an Uber or Lyft crash in Los Angeles?
It depends on what the driver’s app was doing. Once a ride request has been accepted and until the trip ends, the company’s policy provides $1,000,000. App on but no request accepted is $50,000 per person plus excess coverage. App off means no company policy at all. The statutory detail is on the California rideshare page.
I was hit by an Uber, not riding in one. Does that matter?
Not to your eligibility. The coverage is not limited to passengers, so another driver, a pedestrian and a cyclist are all covered on the same phase rules.
The driver told me their company would handle it. Should I wait?
No. A rideshare company’s insurer is not acting for you, and the record that establishes which policy applies is held by that company. Waiting is the one thing that reliably makes these cases harder, because trip data, camera footage and witnesses all thin out over weeks.
I am undocumented. Can I bring a claim without putting myself at risk?
Yes, and the protection is stronger than most people expect. Under Evidence Code 351.2, added by AB 2159, evidence of a person’s immigration status is not admissible in a civil action for personal injury or wrongful death, and discovery into it is not permitted either.
Contact a Culver Legal Los Angeles Rideshare Accident Lawyer
If no report was written, the case rests on records held by other people: a trip log on a company server, footage on a business’s recorder, a witness who has not yet been asked. All three have a shelf life measured in days rather than years. If you were hurt in or by a rideshare vehicle anywhere in Los Angeles, reach us at (310) 600-7881, at any hour. The review costs nothing.
Attorney Advertising. Prior results do not guarantee a similar outcome. Culver Legal, LLP is a California law firm. The information on this page is for general informational purposes and does not constitute legal advice.
