At the Arndt Law Firm, we understand how overwhelming it can be to navigate the aftermath of a rideshare accident in Myrtle Beach, especially when multiple parties like Uber, Lyft, other drivers, or pedestrians may be involved. From the moment you reach out to us, our team is here to guide you through each step, making sure you get clear answers and the support you deserve. We know that questions about insurance, liability, and what to do next can add stress to an already difficult situation.
Our team combines deep knowledge of South Carolina’s rideshare laws with hands-on experience handling Uber and Lyft accident claims throughout Horry County. We work together to investigate the details of your accident, gather all the necessary evidence, and ensure that nothing is overlooked. Our collaborative approach means that no matter how complex your case may be, you have the full strength of our team on your side.
If you or a loved one has been injured in a rideshare accident, don’t hesitate to reach out to us. We can help you understand your rights, especially if insurance coverage is disputed or insufficient, and pursue the compensation you need to move forward.
South Carolina regulates Uber and Lyft under the Transportation Network Company Act, at Section 58-23-1610 and following. The Act sets a graduated insurance scheme keyed to the driver's activity, but does not define phases by number. Instead, coverage depends on whether the driver is off the app, logged on and waiting for a request, or has accepted a ride.
App off: The driver is an ordinary motorist on a personal auto policy, and no company coverage attaches. The available limits may be nothing more than the state minimum of $25,000 per person.
Logged on, waiting for a request: With the app on and no ride accepted, Section 58-23-1630(B) requires primary liability coverage 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. If the driver's own insurance has lapsed or doesn't meet the requirement, the company's policy must cover the claim from the first dollar and defend it (S.C. Code § 58-23-1630(D)).
Ride accepted through drop-off: From the moment a ride request is accepted until the last passenger leaves the vehicle, that entire window, including the drive to the pickup point, is a prearranged ride under Section 58-23-1610(9), and it carries at least $1,000,000 in primary liability coverage plus uninsured motorist coverage under Section 58-23-1630(C).
One caution about published summaries. Several states have $25,000 for property damage while the driver is logged on and waiting for a request. The statute says fifty thousand. Where a secondary source and the code disagree, the code governs.
How much insurance covers an Uber accident in South Carolina?
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, plus uninsured motorist coverage. From acceptance of a ride until the last passenger exits, at least $1,000,000 in primary liability coverage plus uninsured motorist coverage.
The app status is a fact proved from records the companies hold rather than from anyone's memory, and the difference between 'logged on, waiting for a request' and 'ride accepted through drop-off' is nine hundred fifty thousand dollars in coverage.
A trip record shows when the driver logged on, when a request was accepted, the route driven, and when 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 that much riding on the answer.
The request goes out in writing, early, identifying the driver, the vehicle, the date and time, and the trip where 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. Screenshots of that cost nothing and cannot be edited afterward by anyone else.
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 itself.
A rideshare passenger often has no vehicle damage claim, no policy of their own on the vehicle they were in, and no obvious insurer to look to. That leads many to assume their own coverage is irrelevant, and that assumption is worth testing rather than accepting.
South Carolina requires uninsured motorist coverage 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. If a policyholder never returned a signed coverage-selection form within 30 days, South Carolina law requires the insurer to add uninsured and underinsured coverage at the same limits as the liability coverage (S.C. Code § 38-77-350).
Whether a particular policy responds to a person injured as an occupant of someone else's vehicle depends on that policy's language, which is read rather than assumed. For a visitor injured here, the policy in question may have been written in another state to different terms, which is a further reason to have it read rather than guessed at.
There is a matching trap on the driver's side. Section 58-23-1625 expressly allows a personal auto insurer to exclude coverage while a driver is logged on or providing a prearranged ride. A rideshare driver relying on a personal policy while working may find it does not respond at all, which is exactly why South Carolina sets out these coverage tiers by app status.
| 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, plus uninsured motorist coverage | Includes the drive to the pickup point |
The obvious defendant is whichever driver caused the collision, and frequently 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 rather than a settled point. Whether a heightened duty applies to rideshare drivers is unsettled in South Carolina. What the Act plainly does 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. 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 carries additional weight, because since January 1, 2026, a defendant may place a nonparty on the verdict form and shift a share of the fault onto them.
In 2025, Horry County recorded 220 crashes causing death or serious injury, 38 of them involving DUI and 24 involving pedestrians. Rideshare trips here run heavily on Kings Highway (U.S. 17 Business), which clogs in summer; the U.S. 17 Bypass; S.C. 31 (Carolina Bays Parkway), a 65-mph route with no traffic lights; and U.S. 501, which bottlenecks near the coast. Horry County has more responding agencies along these corridors than most South Carolina markets, and a request sent to the wrong one returns nothing.
Myrtle Beach Police Department investigates within the city limits of Myrtle Beach. North Myrtle Beach Police Department covers that city. Conway Police Department handles incidents in Conway. Surfside Beach and Atlantic Beach each have their own municipal police departments. The Horry County Police Department (HCPD) covers the unincorporated county, alongside the South Carolina Highway Patrol, which also patrols the highways. Horry County Fire Rescue responds countywide and generates run reports. The Horry County Coroner's Office maintains a separate file in the event of a fatality. Other municipal departments may hold reports for incidents in their jurisdictions.
That matters more in a rideshare claim than in an ordinary one, because trips routinely cross jurisdictional lines within a single ride. A pickup inside the city and a collision outside it can put the report with a different agency than a passenger expects.
Independent evidence carries weight for the same reason. Horry County operates public traffic cameras through its own site, and the corridor is lined with businesses that record continuously, with footage sitting on retention cycles controlled by whoever owns the camera. The same multi-agency problem runs through every Myrtle Beach crash claim.
Which police department handles a rideshare crash here?
It depends on where the collision occurred rather than where the trip started. Myrtle Beach and North Myrtle Beach have separate departments, and the Highway Patrol covers the highways and the unincorporated county.
Impairment changes the value of a claim rather than its structure. Punitive damages are generally capped at the greater of three times compensatory damages or $500,000 (adjusted for inflation) under S.C. Code § 15-32-530. The cap rises in some cases and does not apply at all where the defendant was impaired, intended harm, or was convicted of a felony for the conduct.
A second defendant may exist where a driver was served at a licensed establishment. Since January 1, 2026, a licensee found liable together with a driver charged with DUI is jointly and severally liable for 50% of actual damages (S.C. Code § 61-2-147). Liability still requires proof that the establishment served the driver unlawfully. The insurance requirement, $1 million aggregate, reducible to $300,000, applies to licensees open after 5 p.m. (S.C. Code § 61-2-145). The drunk driving analysis sets out how those claims interact.
Punitive damages require clear and convincing evidence of wilful, wanton, or reckless conduct, a higher standard than the rest of the case. A criminal charge is useful evidence toward it and is not a precondition.
The steps that protect a rideshare claim close faster than in an ordinary crash, because the most important evidence sits on a company server rather than at the scene.
Screenshot the trip in your own account history immediately. The receipt, the route map, the timestamps, and the driver's identity are all there, and that record cannot be edited by anyone else once captured. It is frequently the only proof a passenger controls.
Photograph the vehicle, including any company decal or placard displayed, and note whether the driver's phone showed an active trip. Get the driver's name and insurance information as you would in any collision, and get the other driver's as well, since the at-fault party may not be the rideshare driver at all.
Establish where the collision happened rather than where the trip started, because that determines which department investigated. A trip beginning inside Myrtle Beach and ending outside it can put the report with a different agency than a passenger expects.
Report the crash to your own insurer even though you were a passenger, since most policies require notice regardless of fault, and get evaluated promptly. A passenger with no vehicle damage claim has nothing anchoring the claim except the medical record.
What should a rideshare passenger do first?
Screenshot the trip from your own account history before anything else, since it fixes the time, route, and driver, and it is the one record you control. Then establish the exact collision location, since that determines which agency holds the report.
South Carolina lets an injured person recover as long as their share of the fault is not greater than the defendant's, under Nelson v. Concrete Supply Co., 303 S.C. 243 (1991), with recovery reduced by that percentage and ending at 51 percent. 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 defendant may ask that a party who was never sued be placed on the verdict form and assigned a share, provided that party is disclosed within 180 days (or later for good cause). Some nonparties, including those immune from suit, cannot be placed on the form (S.C. Code § 15-38-15). The defendant carries the burden of proving that the added party's breach was a proximate cause unless the plaintiff amends to add them.
In a case with two vehicles, two carriers, and a company policy, that mechanism has obvious appeal to a defendant. The date of the crash decides whether it applies at all.
The categories are the same as in any injury claim, and the documentation is often easier. Medical treatment, follow-up care, therapy, prescriptions, and any future care a physician says is likely, from the economic side, along with lost income and lost earning capacity.
South Carolina places no general statutory cap on non-economic damages in an ordinary injury case. Pain, disfigurement, and the loss of activities a person used to enjoy are not limited by statute, and the medical malpractice cap does not travel to a road claim.
Punitive damages are generally capped at the greater of three times compensatory damages or $500,000 (adjusted for inflation) under S.C. Code § 15-32-530. The cap rises in some cases and does not apply at all where the defendant was impaired, intended harm, or was convicted of a felony for the conduct.
A passenger frequently has no vehicle damage claim at all, which removes the anchor an adjuster normally uses to frame an injury as minor. For a visitor, treatment splits between an emergency department here and providers at home, producing a record in two states that has to be reconciled before it can be presented.
The general deadline is three years from the date of the crash under Section 15-3-530(5). In a fatal crash, the three-year deadline for a wrongful death claim runs from the date of death. Where an injury was not apparent at the time, the same three years runs from when the person knew or reasonably should have known a claim existed.
Two shorter deadlines can be at play here. Recovery against a government entity is capped at $300,000 per person and $600,000 per occurrence, and punitive damages are not available (S.C. Code § 15-78-120). A claim against a government entity must also be filed in court within two years after the loss was or should have been discovered. That becomes three years if a verified claim is first filed with the agency within one year (S.C. Code § 15-78-110).
If you were hurt while on the job, you can still sue the at-fault third party, but the workers' comp carrier holds a lien on that recovery. If suit isn't filed within one year of the carrier accepting the claim, the carrier can take over the claim after giving written notice (S.C. Code § 42-1-560). Your employer generally cannot be sued (§ 42-1-540).
Claims by children run longer, tolled during minority, though not beyond one year past the eighteenth birthday.
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.
Suit is brought in the Court of Common Pleas for Horry County, in the Fifteenth Judicial Circuit, at the courthouse at 1301 Second Avenue in Conway, with the Clerk of Court at (843) 915-5080 and a second office at 9630 Scipio Lane in Myrtle Beach at (843) 915-5082.
Rideshare claims involve corporate carriers rather than a local adjuster and 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.
Seriously injured people in the Grand Strand are often taken to Grand Strand Medical Center at 809 82nd Pkwy, the area's Level I adult and Level II pediatric trauma center. Conway Medical Center at 300 Singleton Ridge Rd is a Level III adult trauma center.
The general deadline is three years from the date of the crash under Section 15-3-530(5). In a fatal crash, the three-year deadline for a wrongful death claim runs from the date of death. Where an injury was not apparent at the time, the same three years runs from when the person knew or reasonably should have known a claim existed.
Two shorter statutes may apply. Recovery from a government entity is limited to $300,000 per person and $600,000 per occurrence, and punitive damages are unavailable (S.C. Code § 15-78-120).
A claim against a government must be filed in court within two years of discovering the loss or when it should have been known. If a verified claim is submitted to the agency within one year, the period extends to three years (S.C. Code § 15-78-110).
If you are injured at work, you can still sue the at-fault third party, but the workers' comp carrier has a lien on any recovery. If no suit is filed within one year after the carrier accepts the claim, the carrier can assume control after providing written notice (S.C. Code § 42-1-560). Generally, you cannot sue your employer (S.C. Code § 42-1-540).
South Carolina extends different deadlines for injured children (S.C. Code § 15-3-40), but the calculation depends on the child's age and the claim, so the deadline should be confirmed by a lawyer early.
Suit is brought in the Court of Common Pleas for Horry County, in the Fifteenth Judicial Circuit, at the courthouse at 1301 Second Avenue in Conway, with the Clerk of Court at (843) 915-5080 and a South Strand satellite office at 9630 Scipio Lane, Myrtle Beach ((843) 915-5082). Residency is not required, so a visiting passenger files here in the same way a resident does.
It depends on the driver's app status at impact. Personal insurance applies with the app off. With the app on and no ride accepted, the statute requires primary coverage of at least $50,000 per person and $100,000 per incident, and the company's policy cannot wait for the driver's personal insurer to deny the claim first. Once a ride is accepted, $1 million in primary coverage applies.
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.
Yes. South Carolina requires uninsured motorist coverage and makes underinsured coverage optional, and whether either responds depends on the policy language.
In South Carolina, where the crash occurred, under South Carolina deadlines. Residency is not required.
Nothing up front. Consultations are free, and the fee is contingent on recovery.
The Arndt Law Firm begins a rideshare claim by pinning down the app status, because a $50,000 phase and a $1 million phase look identical at the scene and differ entirely on paper. That means written preservation requests for trip and telematics records while they still exist.
Establishing which agency holds the collision file comes next, since a trip that begins in one municipality and ends in another can put the report somewhere a passenger would not think to look. Horry County claims are filed in the Court of Common Pleas in Conway. Attorney Jonathan S. Arndt has been licensed in South Carolina since 2018 and reviews the firm's rideshare matters.
A first review carries no charge and no fee unless the claim recovers. You can reach the firm through the contact page. Trip data and third-party video both sit on retention schedules measured in weeks, a far shorter window than the three-year filing deadline suggests.
Last reviewed: August 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.
