Uninsured motorist coverage rules in the District of Columbia

If the driver who hit you in DC carried no insurance, carried too little, or drove off without stopping, the coverage that actually pays you is your own. Uninsured and underinsured motorist coverage (UM and UIM) is the part of your policy that steps in when the at-fault driver can't. The District handles it differently from most states, and two of those differences come with hard deadlines that can quietly kill a claim. Here is what the D.C. Code requires, in plain terms.

What DC requires you to carry

Every auto policy on a vehicle registered or principally garaged in the District has to include uninsured motorist coverage.¹ The mandatory minimums match the liability minimums: $25,000 for bodily injury to one person, $50,000 per accident, and $5,000 for property damage.¹² DC is one of the few places that builds property damage into required UM coverage, but that property payment carries a $200 deductible written into the statute itself.¹

The District's baseline liability minimum is 25/50/10, and DC DMV lists the same $25,000/$50,000 figures for uninsured motorist bodily injury.² Those numbers haven't moved since 1986. Because your UM bodily-injury floor is tied to them, a driver carrying only the minimum has just $25,000 in UM protection per person, which a serious ER visit can burn through on its own.

You can buy up. The statute lets you request UM limits as high as $100,000 per person and $300,000 per accident, plus $25,000 in UM property damage.¹ Given how thin the mandatory floor is, raising your UM limits is one of the most useful things a DC driver can do before a crash ever happens.

Underinsured coverage is optional, and you can lose it in writing

DC treats "uninsured" and "underinsured" as separate things. An underinsured motor vehicle is one that is insured, but whose liability limits are too low to cover what you're owed.³ Insurers have to offer UIM up to your UM limits, with one carve-out: motorcycles and motor-driven cycles.¹ You're allowed to reject UIM, but the rejection has to be in writing, and once you reject it your insurer never has to offer it to you again.¹ Pull out your declarations page and check. Plenty of DC drivers who believe they have "full coverage" waived UIM years ago and forgot.

The 60-day rule when you settle with the at-fault driver

This is the trap most people never hear about until it's too late. Say the at-fault driver's insurer offers you its full policy limits, and you want to take that money and still pursue your own UIM carrier for the rest. You can't just cash the check. You first have to send your UIM carrier written notice, by certified mail, of the proposed settlement.⁴

From there your UIM carrier has 60 days. Within that window it can protect its right to chase the at-fault driver later (subrogation) only by advancing you a payment equal to the settlement you were offered.⁴ If it doesn't pay inside 60 days, it waives subrogation and you're free to accept the settlement and still go after your UIM coverage.⁴ Skip the notice step, and you can wreck your own UIM claim before it starts. The rule lives at D.C. Code § 31-2407.01, and it does not bend on timing.

Stacking

If you insure more than one vehicle, or you're covered under more than one policy, "stacking" is the question of whether you can add the UM limits together. DC lets insurers write anti-stacking language into the policy for both UM and UIM.¹ Whether you can stack in your case turns on the exact wording of your policy, not on a single statewide rule.

How DC's no-fault choice affects a UM claim

DC is a "choice" jurisdiction. Standard liability (tort) coverage is the default, but drivers can elect optional personal injury protection, a no-fault benefit.¹ There's a string attached. If you elected PIP and you take those benefits, you have to notify your PIP insurer within 60 days of the crash, and choosing PIP limits your right to sue the at-fault driver unless you clear a threshold: either a serious injury (permanent scarring or disfigurement, permanent impairment, or an impairment that keeps you from your usual activities for more than 180 continuous days) or medical bills and lost wages that run past your available PIP benefits.⁵

That matters for UM because a UM or UIM claim stands in the shoes of a claim against the at-fault driver. If your right to sue that driver is restricted, it can shape what you're able to recover from your own carrier too. If you aren't sure whether you elected PIP, find out early.

Contributory negligence follows the claim

DC is one of a small number of places that still applies pure contributory negligence to ordinary driver-versus-driver crashes: if you're found even 1% at fault, you can be barred from recovering anything.⁶ That defense doesn't disappear in a UM claim, because your own insurer can raise everything the at-fault driver could have. (Pedestrians and cyclists get a more forgiving comparative-fault standard by statute, but that's a separate track.)⁶

Deadlines that can end your claim

You generally have three years to file a personal-injury lawsuit in DC, counted from the date of the crash.⁷ The same three-year clock covers vehicle and other personal-property damage.⁷ A dispute with your own UM carrier is ultimately a contract matter, and policies routinely set their own, shorter notice and proof-of-loss requirements, so read yours and don't sit on it.

For the loss in your car's resale value after a repair, see our District of Columbia diminished value page. If you need the police crash report to back up the claim, our DC crash reports page walks through getting a copy.

The numbers are about to change, but haven't yet

The Council passed the Motor Vehicle Insurance Modernization Act of 2025, which became Act A26-0358 after it was enacted without the Mayor's signature and published in the D.C. Register on July 3, 2026.⁸ It raises the mandatory bodily-injury minimums from 25/50 to 50/100, strengthens underinsured coverage, and builds in automatic increases every ten years starting in 2037.⁸ Because the UM minimums are tied to the liability minimums, the required UM floor would rise along with them. As of this writing the act still had to clear the Congressional review period that DC legislation goes through, so it had not taken effect, and the 25/50/10 baseline with matching $25,000/$50,000 UM limits was still the law.⁸ If you're buying or renewing, ask your agent which set of numbers applies on your effective date.

If you're trying to work out whether your UM or UIM coverage reaches your crash, or you're staring down that 60-day settlement rule, a local attorney can help. Our legal directory is a place to start.

This is general information, not legal advice.

Sources

1. D.C. Code § 31-2406, Availability of required and optional insurance and benefits (UM/UIM limits, $200 property-damage deductible, optional higher limits, UIM offer and written rejection, anti-stacking). https://code.dccouncil.gov/us/dc/council/code/sections/31-2406

2. District of Columbia DMV, Vehicle Insurance requirements. https://dmv.dc.gov/service/vehicle-insurance

3. D.C. Code § 31-2402(32A), definition of "underinsured motor vehicle." https://code.dccouncil.gov/us/dc/council/code/sections/31-2402

4. D.C. Code § 31-2407.01, Notice of proposed settlement for policy limits to underinsured motorist coverage carrier; waiver of subrogation; time limits. https://code.dccouncil.gov/us/dc/council/code/sections/31-2407.01

5. D.C. Code § 31-2405, personal injury protection election (60-day notice) and tort thresholds. https://code.dccouncil.gov/us/dc/council/code/sections/31-2405

6. Wingfield v. Peoples Drug Store, Inc., 379 A.2d 685 (D.C. 1977); D.C. Code § 50-2204.52 (comparative standard for vulnerable users). https://law.justia.com/cases/district-of-columbia/court-of-appeals/1977/11243-3.html

7. D.C. Code § 12-301(8) (personal injury, 3 years) and § 12-301(3) (injury to personal property, 3 years). https://code.dccouncil.gov/us/dc/council/code/sections/12-301

8. Council of the District of Columbia, B26-0057 / Act A26-0358, Motor Vehicle Insurance Modernization Act of 2025. https://lims.dccouncil.gov/Legislation/B26-0057