A crash involving an Uber or Lyft raises an insurance question that an ordinary car wreck does not: which policy covers the harm depends on what the rideshare driver was doing at the moment of the crash.
If you were in a crash involving a rideshare car, South Carolina law lets you recover from those at fault, as long as you were 50 percent or less at fault. However, the key to a full recovery is knowing which coverage applies.
At the Arndt Law Firm, we represent people injured in rideshare crashes across Bluffton and Beaufort County, whether passengers, other drivers, or pedestrians. If you wonder whether you are owed compensation, contact us.
South Carolina regulates Uber and Lyft under the Transportation Network Company Act, South Carolina Code Section 58-23-1610 and following. The Act sets a graduated insurance scheme keyed to the driver's activity, and the phases are not a company policy choice. They are statutory minimums.
Phase one is the app being off. The driver is an ordinary motorist on a personal auto policy, and no company coverage attaches at all. That means the available limits may be nothing more than the state minimum of $25,000 per person.
Phase two is the app on with no ride accepted. Under Section 58-23-1630(B), the required coverage is primary liability of at least $50,000 for death and bodily injury per person, at least $100,000 per incident, and at least $50,000 for property damage, together with uninsured motorist coverage. The statute permits those limits to be satisfied by the driver's insurance, the company's insurance, or both, which is where disputes about which carrier responds first begin.
Phase three runs from the moment a ride request is accepted until the last passenger leaves the vehicle. That whole window, including the drive to the pickup point, is a prearranged ride under Section 58-23-1610(9), and it carries at least $1 million in primary liability coverage under Section 58-23-1630(C).
It depends on the app. With the app off, only the driver's personal policy applies. With the app on and no ride accepted, at least $50,000 per person and $100,000 per incident. From acceptance of a ride until the last passenger exits, at least $1 million in primary liability coverage.
The phase is a fact, and it is proved from records the companies hold rather than from anyone's memory. The trip record shows when the driver logged on, when a request was accepted, the route driven, and when the ride ended. Telematics data collected through the app can show speed and phone handling in the seconds before impact.
None of that arrives on its own. It has to be requested in writing, and as early as possible. A driver's own account of what the app was doing is worth having and is not evidence a carrier will accept against a million dollar difference in exposure.
Independent evidence matters for the same reason. Beaufort County operates public traffic cameras, viewable through the county's own site, and private premises along a corridor such as Fording Island Road commonly record as well. Recorded footage is held on a retention cycle by whoever owns the camera.
A passenger has one advantage here. The trip existed in their own account history, with a receipt, a route map, a timestamp, and the driver's identity. That record should be preserved by screenshot before anything else happens.
The obvious defendant is whichever driver caused the collision, and often that is not the rideshare driver at all. A passenger injured when another vehicle runs a light has a claim against that driver, with the rideshare policies sitting behind it as uninsured or underinsured coverage where the at fault limits fall short.
A claim against the company itself is a separate question from a claim against the driver, and it turns on the relationship between them, which is contested territory, not a settled point. What the Act plainly does do is require that coverage exists at each phase, which for an injured person is usually the more useful route.
Other defendants appear depending on the facts. Depending on how a collision happened, a vehicle owner who is not the driver, a maintenance provider, a road contractor responsible for a work zone, or a property owner responsible for an entrance can each be a proper defendant.
Identifying them early now carries additional weight, because a defendant may place a nonparty on the verdict form and shift a share of the fault onto them. A South Carolina personal injury lawyer can explain how this mechanism works in general.
Yes, as long as you were 50 percent or less at fault. South Carolina law, under Nelson v. Concrete Supply Company (1991), establishes a comparative negligence rule. Your recovery is reduced by your percentage of fault, and it is barred completely at 51 percent. A key part of building a strong claim is keeping your share of fault low.
Rideshare passengers frequently assume their own auto insurance has nothing to do with a crash they were not driving in. That assumption is worth testing rather than accepting, because the terms of a household policy decide the question and those terms are read, not guessed.
South Carolina requires uninsured motorist coverage at minimum limits and makes underinsured coverage optional. The optional coverage carries a rule worth checking on every claim: an insurer must hold a signed form showing that underinsured coverage was offered and either accepted or rejected. Where the carrier cannot produce that form, it must add the coverage and rate for it.
Those minimum limits are set by South Carolina Code Section 38-77-140 and confirmed on the South Carolina Department of Insurance's own site as 25/50/25: $25,000 per person and $50,000 per accident for bodily injury, plus $25,000 for property damage, with uninsured motorist coverage required to match those same numbers.
A household policy carrying only those state minimums may add little on top of a $50,000 phase-two rideshare policy, which is one more reason the underinsured motorist question is worth confirming.
Under South Carolina Code Section 58-23-1625 expressly allows a personal auto insurer to exclude coverage while the driver is logged on or providing a prearranged ride. A rideshare driver who is relying on a personal policy while working may find it does not respond at all, which is exactly why the statutory phases exist.
| Driver status at impact | Primary coverage | Practical note |
|---|---|---|
| App off | Driver's personal policy only | Personal limits may be the 25/50 state minimum |
| App on, no ride accepted | At least $50,000 per person, $100,000 per incident, $50,000 property damage | May be satisfied by driver, company, or both |
| Ride accepted through last passenger exit | At least $1,000,000 primary liability | Includes the drive to the pickup point |
That does not necessarily end the insurance inquiry. South Carolina's TNC law is designed to require coverage during the driver's different periods of activity, including when the driver is logged on and waiting for a request and when a ride has been accepted.
A trip record held by the company shows the log-on time, the moment a request was accepted, the route driven, and the point the ride ended. Telematics collected through the app can add speed and phone handling in the seconds before impact. Neither is produced voluntarily, and neither is likely to be volunteered by a carrier with a nine hundred fifty thousand dollar difference riding on the answer.
The request goes out in writing, early, and it should identify the driver, the vehicle, the date and time, and the trip if a passenger can supply it. A passenger has an advantage worth using immediately: the trip exists in their own account history with a receipt, a route map, a timestamp, and the driver's identity, and screenshots of that record cost nothing and cannot be edited afterward by anyone else.
Independent evidence carries weight for the same reason. Beaufort County operates public traffic cameras, viewable through the county's own site, and premises along a corridor such as Fording Island Road commonly record as well. Footage sits on a retention cycle controlled by whoever owns the camera and is requested rather than discovered later.
Where the driver's own account of app status conflicts with the company record, the record generally wins. Where the company produces nothing, the failure to preserve becomes an issue in its own right, which is a further reason the written demand matters more than a phone call.
Through the company's trip and telematics records rather than anyone's recollection. A passenger should screenshot their own trip history immediately, and a written preservation request should go to the company early, since the difference between coverage phases can be substantial.
Emergency treatment, imaging, follow-up care, therapy, prescriptions, and any future care a physician says is likely make up the economic damages, together with lost income and lost earning capacity if an injury affects what a person can do for a living.
South Carolina places no general statutory cap on non-economic damages in an ordinary injury case, so pain and suffering, disfigurement, and the loss of activities a person used to enjoy are not limited by statute. The cap that exists in the code applies to medical malpractice and does not reach a road claim.
Two features are specific to this claim type. A passenger frequently has no vehicle damage claim at all, which removes the anchor an adjuster normally uses to frame an injury as minor.
Most Bluffton crash patients are treated locally, at Novant Health's Bluffton emergency department on Parkside Drive, at Novant Health Hilton Head Medical Center, or at Beaufort Memorial's Pratt Emergency Center in Beaufort.
Neither Beaufort County hospital holds a state trauma-center designation, so the nearest Level I trauma center is Memorial Health University Medical Center in Savannah, about 30 miles away. A file that ends up split between a Bluffton ER and a Georgia trauma center needs both records requests started early.
South Carolina lets an injured person recover as long as their share of the fault is not greater than 50 percent, under Nelson v. Concrete Supply Company (1991). Recovery is reduced by that percentage, and at 51 percent it ends. A passenger is rarely assigned fault, which makes a rideshare passenger claim unusually clean on liability and unusually contested on coverage.
For claims accruing on or after January 1, 2026, a further rule applies. A defendant may ask that a party who was never sued be placed on the verdict form and given a share of the fault, provided that party is disclosed within one hundred eighty days of the start of the action. The defendant carries the burden of proving that the added party's breach was a proximate cause.
In a rideshare case with two vehicles, two carriers, and a company policy, that mechanism has obvious appeal to a defendant. It also means the date of the crash decides which version of the rule applies, so the incident date is checked before the apportionment analysis begins.
Yes. Under South Carolina Code Section 56-5-6540(c), a safety belt violation is not negligence per se, is not contributory negligence, and is not admissible as evidence in a civil action.
Impairment changes the value of the claim rather than its structure. South Carolina caps punitive damages at the greater of three times the compensatory award or a statutory figure adjusted annually for inflation, and removes the cap entirely where the defendant acted under the influence of alcohol or drugs to the degree that judgment was substantially impaired.
A second defendant may exist where the driver was served at a licensed establishment. Since January 1, 2026, a licensee found liable alongside a charged driver is jointly and severally liable for fifty percent of the plaintiff's actual damages. A South Carolina drunk driving accident lawyer works cases in which the at-fault driver was intoxicated and may even pursue compensation from the establishment that served them.
Punitive damages require clear and convincing evidence of wilful, wanton, or reckless conduct, which is a higher standard than the rest of the case carries. A criminal charge is useful evidence toward it and is not a precondition for the civil claim.
South Carolina caps these damages at the greater of three times the compensatory award or 500,000 dollars under South Carolina Code Section 15-32-530(A), with the dollar figure adjusted annually for inflation.
Section 15-32-530(B) raises that ceiling to the greater of four times compensatory damages or 2,000,000 dollars where the conduct could subject the defendant to a felony conviction or involved unreasonable financial gain with known danger. Section 15-32-530(C) removes the cap entirely for intent to harm, a felony conviction arising from the same conduct, or impairment by alcohol or drugs to the degree that judgment was substantially impaired.
The general deadline is three years from the date of the crash under South Carolina Code Section 15-3-530(5). If an injury was not apparent at the time, the same three years runs from the point the person knew or reasonably should have known a claim existed.
Two shorter clocks can apply. A claim involving a government vehicle runs two years under the Tort Claims Act, extended to three if a verified claim is filed within the first year.
If the injured person was working at the time, South Carolina Code Section 42-1-560(b) requires the third-party action to be commenced within one year of the compensation carrier accepting liability or making payment under an award, and the carrier holds a lien on whatever is recovered. Missing that year does not end the claim.
Under Section 42-1-560(c), the right of action passes by assignment to the carrier after written notice and a twenty-day period, which is a different problem with different answers, and one worth raising immediately
Claims by children run longer, since the limitations period is tolled while a victim is under eighteen.
The evidence clock is shorter than any of these. Trip records, telematics, and third-party camera footage are all held by parties with no obligation to keep them once their own retention period runs.
Which agency investigated determines where the collision report sits. Bluffton Police Department covers incidents inside town limits, and the South Carolina Highway Patrol covers the corridor beyond them.
A suit has to be brought in the Court of Common Pleas for Beaufort County, in the Fourteenth Judicial Circuit, with the Clerk of Court at 102 Ribaut Road.
Rideshare claims involve corporate carriers rather than a local adjuster, and they are frequently resolved without suit. Filing still changes the posture, because it converts a coverage argument between insurers into a case with discovery obligations attached to it.
It depends on the driver's app status at impact. Personal insurance applies with the app off, the company's primary coverage of $50,000 applies while waiting for a ride, and $1 million in primary coverage applies once a ride is accepted.
In most cases, the claim runs against the drivers and the applicable policies. Whether the company itself is liable turns on its relationship with the driver, which is contested ground rather than a settled rule.
Usually yes. A passenger is rarely at fault, and when the rideshare driver was carrying you, substantial commercial coverage generally applies. You can pursue a claim against whichever driver was responsible.
Yes. South Carolina requires uninsured motorist coverage and makes underinsured coverage optional, and whether either responds in a given situation depends on the policy language, which is worth having read.
Yes, as long as you were 50 percent or less at fault. Your recovery is reduced by your percentage of fault, and barred entirely at 51 percent or more.
Three years from the date of the crash under South Carolina Code Section 15-3-530(5), with shorter deadlines for government defendants and workers' compensation third-party claims.
The Arndt Law Firm handles these cases on a contingency basis, meaning no fee unless there is a recovery. A free consultation is the usual way to discuss whether you have a claim.
At the Arndt Law Firm, we approach every Bluffton rideshare case by establishing the driver's phase at the moment of the crash, obtaining the company's app data that determines which coverage applies, proving fault, and identifying every responsible party and policy to reach the available coverage.
Since attorney Arndt previously defended insurers, we understand how these claims are evaluated and how the phase determination affects coverage, and we build each case to reach the full recovery a serious injury requires.
If you were injured in a rideshare crash in Bluffton or anywhere in Beaufort County, whether as a passenger, another driver, or a pedestrian, time is of the essence. Contact us or call (843) 493-4590 for a free consultation; we handle these cases on a contingency basis, so there is no fee unless there is a recovery.
Last reviewed: September 2026
This page was reviewed by Jonathan S. Arndt, licensed in South Carolina since 2018.
Content is provided for informational purposes only and does not constitute legal advice. Consult a licensed South Carolina attorney for guidance specific to your situation.
