Truck Accident Settlement Amounts in North Dakota

In North Dakota, a truck settlement runs through the state's no-fault system before the trucking company's federal insurance ever comes into play. Here is what the law actually sets, from the $2,500 injury threshold to the six-year deadline.

ThatCarHitMe.com Editorial
Jun 19, 2026
6 min read

Truck accident settlement amounts in North Dakota

A truck crash settles differently from a fender bender, and the difference is written into North Dakota's no-fault statute and the federal rules that govern interstate carriers. Before you can collect a dollar from the trucking company for your pain, the state routes you through your own policy first.1 What makes a truck case larger sits on the other side of that hurdle: a semi hauling freight across state lines must carry a federal minimum 30 times North Dakota's per-person requirement for a private car.

Here is how the numbers actually stack up if a commercial truck hurt you in North Dakota.

No-fault comes first

North Dakota's Auto Accident Reparations Act makes basic no-fault benefits, often called PIP, mandatory on every registered vehicle. They pay your economic losses without regard to fault, up to $30,000 per person per accident.1 Inside that cap, lost wages are paid at 85 percent of your income and limited to $150 a week, with $3,500 set aside for funeral and burial costs.2 Your insurer has to pay a valid claim within 30 days of receiving reasonable proof of loss, and unpaid benefits draw interest after that.3

No-fault also decides when you can sue the trucker for more. Under section 26.1-41-08, the at-fault party is shielded from your pain-and-suffering claim unless your injury clears the state's "serious injury" threshold.4 North Dakota defines a serious injury as one causing death, dismemberment, serious and permanent disfigurement, disability beyond 60 days, or medical expenses over $2,500.5 Real truck-crash injuries usually clear that bar without trouble, which is why the value of a case with surgery or a permanent injury looks nothing like the value of a minor soft-tissue claim. Your economic losses above the PIP cap stay recoverable from the trucking company whether or not the threshold is met.4

The insurance that actually pays

This is where a truck settlement separates from a car settlement. North Dakota only requires a private driver to carry 25/50/25 liability coverage: $25,000 per person, $50,000 per crash, and $25,000 for property.6 A for-hire truck in interstate commerce answers to a federal floor instead. Under 49 CFR 387.9, a carrier hauling general freight in a vehicle over 10,001 pounds has to carry at least $750,000 in liability coverage.7 Trucks carrying oil or hazardous materials in bulk carry $1 million to $5 million.7 A July 2026 rulemaking touched that section, but it only tidied the wording and left the dollar figures alone, so the $750,000 floor is current.8

That gap matters in the Bakken. A crude tanker or a frac-sand hauler working the oil patch is far more likely to sit behind a seven-figure policy than the pickup beside it. When the truck's coverage still is not enough, your own uninsured and underinsured motorist coverage is the backstop. North Dakota requires UM and UIM on every policy at the 25/50 minimum and does not allow a policyholder to waive it outright.9

What can shrink your recovery

North Dakota follows modified comparative fault. Your damages drop by your share of the blame, and you recover nothing once your fault is as great as the combined fault of everyone else, which works as a 50 percent bar.10 A truck case usually has several defendants: the driver, the motor carrier, and sometimes a broker, a shipper, or a maintenance contractor. State law makes each one liable only for its own percentage of fault rather than jointly for the whole, unless they acted in concert.10 Pinning down those percentages is much of what a truck settlement negotiation is about.

The collateral source rule can lower the economic-damage figure too. After a verdict, the defendant can ask the court to reduce economic damages by amounts already paid from other sources, though your own health or life insurance does not count against you.11

Caps and the punitive exception

North Dakota puts no hard cap on compensatory damages in an ordinary injury case. Awards do face one checkpoint: an economic-damage award over $250,000 can be reviewed by the court for reasonableness, and the burden falls on the party challenging it.12 Pain and suffering and other noneconomic damages are not capped at all.

Punitive damages work differently. North Dakota calls them exemplary damages, you cannot demand them in your original complaint, and you have to win the court's permission to add the claim by showing evidence of oppression, fraud, or malice.13 If they are awarded, they cannot exceed twice the compensatory damages or $250,000, whichever is greater.13 The threshold is lower when a driver caused the crash while impaired: a blood alcohol level of .08 percent or higher, drug impairment, or a refused chemical test is enough for a jury to weigh exemplary damages.13 North Dakota's dram shop law opens a further source of recovery when a bar or a person knowingly served alcohol to an obviously intoxicated driver or a minor who then caused the crash.14

The deadlines that end a claim

You generally have six years from the crash to file a personal injury lawsuit in North Dakota, one of the longer windows in the country.15 Damage to your vehicle, including its diminished value, carries the same six-year limit.15 A wrongful death claim is the sharp exception: it has to be filed within two years of the death.16 Waiting is still risky. The black-box data and driver logs that decide a truck case can be overwritten or lost long before the statute runs.

North Dakota truck crashes in context

Most heavy-truck crashes here happen away from town. Over the past decade about three-quarters of crashes involving heavy vehicles occurred in rural areas, on the two-lane highways and oil-field roads of the west, and roughly one heavy-vehicle-related death occurred every 18 days.17 Statewide, North Dakota recorded 89 traffic deaths in 2024 across 9,803 reported crashes, the lowest toll in 24 years.17 A crash becomes reportable once it involves an injury, a death, or at least $4,000 in property damage, and that report is the document an adjuster asks for first.17 You can pull the official record through North Dakota crash reports.

If you are weighing a settlement offer against what your claim is worth, the levers are the same ones above: your PIP benefits, the serious-injury threshold, the carrier's federal coverage, your share of fault, and the filing deadline. A North Dakota attorney who handles trucking cases can put real numbers to each of them for your situation.

This article is general information, not legal advice.

Sources

  1. North Dakota Century Code § 26.1-41-01, -02, Auto Accident Reparations Act, basic no-fault benefits and $30,000 maximum. https://ndlegis.gov/cencode/t26-1c41.pdf

  2. N.D.C.C. § 26.1-41-01(2), (24), work loss at 85% of income, $150 per week cap, $3,500 funeral benefit. https://ndlegis.gov/cencode/t26-1c41.pdf

  3. N.D.C.C. § 26.1-41-09(2), benefits overdue if unpaid 30 days after reasonable proof of loss. https://ndlegis.gov/cencode/t26-1c41.pdf

  4. N.D.C.C. § 26.1-41-08, secured person exemption and tort limitation. https://ndlegis.gov/cencode/t26-1c41.pdf

  5. N.D.C.C. § 26.1-41-01(21), definition of "serious injury." https://ndlegis.gov/cencode/t26-1c41.pdf

  6. N.D.C.C. §§ 39-16.1-05, 39-16.1-11, 25/50/25 minimum financial responsibility limits. https://ndlegis.gov/cencode/t39c16-1.pdf

  7. 49 CFR 387.9, Schedule of Limits, minimum public liability for motor carriers of property ($750,000 general freight; $1,000,000 to $5,000,000 for oil and hazardous materials). https://www.ecfr.gov/current/title-49/subtitle-B/chapter-III/subchapter-B/part-387/subpart-A/section-387.9

  8. FMCSA final rule, 91 FR 45653 (July 21, 2026), technical amendment to 49 CFR 387.9 that revised descriptive wording without changing the dollar minimums. https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/FR-2026-07-21/pdf/2026-14701.pdf

  9. N.D.C.C. §§ 26.1-40-15.2, 26.1-40-15.3, mandatory uninsured and underinsured motorist coverage. https://ndlegis.gov/cencode/t26-1c40.pdf

  10. N.D.C.C. § 32-03.2-02, modified comparative fault and several (non-joint) liability. https://ndlegis.gov/cencode/t32c03-2.pdf

  11. N.D.C.C. § 32-03.2-06, reduction of economic damages for collateral source payments. https://ndlegis.gov/cencode/t32c03-2.pdf

  12. N.D.C.C. § 32-03.2-08, review of reasonableness for economic-damage awards over $250,000. https://ndlegis.gov/cencode/t32c03-2.pdf

  13. N.D.C.C. § 32-03.2-11, exemplary damages, the 2x-compensatory-or-$250,000 limit, and the impaired-driver trigger. https://ndlegis.gov/cencode/t32c03-2.pdf

  14. N.D.C.C. § 5-01-06.1, dram shop and social host liability. https://ndlegis.gov/cencode/t05c01.pdf

  15. N.D.C.C. § 28-01-16(4), (5), six-year limitation for personal injury and for injury to property. https://ndlegis.gov/cencode/t28c01.pdf

  16. N.D.C.C. § 28-01-18(4), two-year limitation for wrongful death. https://ndlegis.gov/cencode/t28c01.pdf

  17. North Dakota Department of Transportation, 2024 Crash Summary (89 fatalities; 9,803 reported crashes; heavy-vehicle crash and fatality rates; $4,000 reporting threshold). https://www.visionzero.nd.gov/sites/default/files/documents/statistics/NDDOT-Crash-Summary-2024.pdf

About This Guide

Written by: ThatCarHitMe.com Editorial

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