Berks Connect
Money & Insurance

Full Tort vs Limited Tort in PA, a Berks County Answer

What each tort option keeps and gives up under Pennsylvania law, the exceptions, the 40 percent rule on four coverages, and how to get both prices.

Berks Connect Blog|Published October 3, 2026
Image for Full Tort vs Limited Tort in PA, a Berks County Answer

Full tort keeps your right to be paid for pain and suffering after a crash another driver caused. Limited tort gives that up unless the injury is serious or one of a short list of exceptions applies, and in exchange the state's pricing rule takes 40% off four of the coverages on your bill. Under either option you can still seek your medical bills and other money losses from the driver at fault, so full tort vs limited tort in Pennsylvania comes down to two things: what that pain and suffering claim is worth to your household, and what the price gap is on your own policy.

Any of the agencies on our Berks County insurance agents page can price your policy both ways, and that's the one thing I'd do before signing.

Limited tort keeps your claim for the bills and gives up pain and suffering.

Pennsylvania gives the policyholder on every personal auto policy a choice between two tort options, and the insurer has to put both in front of you in writing. That's the line on your renewal notice, or on the application for a new policy.

Under full tort, you and the members of your household keep an unrestricted right to seek payment for injuries another driver caused, including pain and suffering and the other losses that don't come with a receipt. Under limited tort, you keep the right to seek all medical and other out-of-pocket expenses, but not pain and suffering, unless the injury meets the law's definition of serious or one of the exceptions applies.

So can you sue with limited tort? Yes, for money. Hospital bills, therapy, missed wages: all of that is still yours to claim under either option. What limited tort takes off the table is the money for what the injury did to your life beyond the bills.

A serious injury restores the full claim, and so do six other situations.

The law defines a serious injury as one resulting in death, serious impairment of body function or permanent serious disfigurement. Meet that line and a limited tort driver can claim pain and suffering as if they'd chosen full tort. This post is general information; a lawyer answers questions about a specific crash.

Then there are the exceptions, a short list. A limited tort driver keeps the full claim whenever the driver at fault:

  1. Is convicted of driving under the influence of alcohol or a controlled substance in that accident, or goes through the court's ARD program for it instead of being convicted.
  2. Is driving a car registered in another state.
  3. Intended to injure themselves or someone else.
  4. Didn't carry the insurance the law requires.

Two more aren't about the other driver. A limited tort driver keeps full tort rights against a business that designed, made, repaired or serviced the vehicle, over a defect it caused or didn't fix. And a limited tort driver keeps full tort rights if injured while riding in something other than a private passenger car. That's the complete list.

One signature binds your spouse and the relatives living with you.

Your choice isn't only yours. It covers your spouse, any relative living in your household, and any minor in your custody, unless one of them is the named policyholder on a personal auto policy of their own. Where two or more people are named on one policy, any one of them can make the election for all of them. So the form one spouse signs sets the rule for the teenager who drives on weekends and for any relative living under the same roof.

What if someone is covered under two policies with different choices? If they were riding in a car insured under one of those policies, that policy's choice decides. If they weren't, they have full tort.

Someone who owns no registered car and isn't covered under anyone's auto policy isn't bound by limited tort at all; they keep the right to claim pain and suffering. That's the person with no car who lives on their own, not the relative in your house, who is covered by your policy and your choice whether or not they own a car. About one Berks household in twelve has no vehicle, and in the City of Reading it's nearly one in four. The opposite case: an owner of a registered car who carries no insurance is treated as having chosen limited tort.

Full tort is what you get if you sign nothing, and your choice follows you until you change it.

When you first take out a policy, the company has to give you the choice before it issues the policy, and if you don't sign and return the election you're considered to have chosen full tort and charged the full tort premium. Limited tort happens only if you sign for it, with one exception the law adds on its own: an owner who registers a car and carries no insurance is treated as limited tort.

Once you've chosen, the choice stays. It carries over to every renewal and replacement policy, and any other personal auto policy where you're the named policyholder, until your insurer receives a completed form electing the other option. A renewal you never answer keeps whatever you already have. So the box you or a spouse ticked years ago is still your answer today unless someone signed a new form since.

Changing it, either direction, takes a form. Every renewal notice carries the tort election and ends with the same instruction: tell your agent, broker or company, then request and complete the form. And no insurer can cancel, refuse to write or refuse to renew a policy based on which tort option you picked.

The saving is 40% on four coverages, not on the whole bill.

The state's pricing rule sets the limited tort discount at 40% on four coverages: bodily injury liability, uninsured motorist, underinsured motorist, and first party benefits, which is the part of your policy that pays your own medical bills. An insurer can file a different figure only if its own data supports it.

The rule covers those four coverages and no others, so the 40% applies to part of your bill, not the whole thing, and how big that part is depends on how your premium splits. A driver carrying full coverage on a newer car, where collision and comprehensive are the biggest lines, saves a smaller share of the bill than a driver whose policy is mostly liability.

Both options side by side look like this.

Full tort Limited tort
Money losses from a crash someone else caused (medical bills, lost wages, out-of-pocket costs) You can seek them You can seek them
Pain and suffering and other nonmonetary damages You can seek them Only for a serious injury (death, serious impairment of body function, or permanent serious disfigurement) or when one of the law's exceptions applies
What you get if you sign nothing This one Only if you sign for it (an owner who registers a car and carries no insurance is treated as limited tort)
What it costs The higher premium 40 percent less on four coverages under the state's pricing rule (bodily injury liability, first-party medical benefits, uninsured and underinsured motorist); the rest of the bill is unchanged

The last two rows are the parts you control today; the serious-injury line and the exceptions are what the law decides later.

How to get both prices from a Berks agent.

The gap depends on your car, your coverages and your household, so the number lives on your own quote. By law the insurer has to tell you what the required coverages cost under either tort option when you ask, by phone if that's how you ask. The election notice itself is supposed to show a dollar amount for each option; if what you're looking at shows only the two choices, ask for the two amounts.

You won't be the first to ask: one Wyomissing agency lists "do I need full tort or is limited tort OK?" among the questions its customers bring in, and another Wyomissing agency's yearly policy checklist asks whether you understand the difference between the two. Pick one from our Berks County insurance agents page and ask it. An independent agent can price the pair with several companies at once; the difference between the two kinds of agent is covered in independent vs captive agents in Berks County, along with the questions to ask in a first meeting.

So here's what I'd do. Call your agent, or one from the page above, and ask for the same policy priced both ways, line by line, so you can see where the gap sits. Then decide with both numbers in front of you, and sign the option you meant, because it'll follow you to every renewal after this one. If you're starting a new policy tonight, before you've seen both prices, the default is full tort, and whichever one you pick can be changed with a form once you have the numbers. If you already have a policy, ignoring the renewal keeps what you have.

Frequently asked questions.

Is full tort worth it?

That's the question this post won't answer for you, because it sits in two numbers only you can see: the price gap on your own quote and what a pain and suffering claim is worth to your household. The gap depends on how much of your bill lives in the four discounted coverages.

Can you sue with limited tort in PA?

Yes. Limited tort keeps your right to seek all medical and other out-of-pocket expenses from a driver who was at fault. What it restricts is pain and suffering, and even that comes back if the injury is serious under the law's definition or one of the exceptions applies.

What happens if I never return the tort form?

On a new policy, you're treated as having chosen full tort and billed the full tort premium. On a renewal, nothing changes: the choice already on your policy carries over until you sign a form for the other one.

Does my choice cover my spouse and kids?

Yes: your spouse, any relative living in your household, and any minor in your custody, whether or not they own a car, unless they're the named policyholder on another auto policy. Someone who owns no car and isn't covered under anyone's policy is outside it and keeps full rights.

Sources