It’s time to get back to my list of Top 10 Commercial Insurance Myths and Misconceptions. Today we discuss misconception #3: Fraud Claims Are Not Covered. This issue most frequently arises in the D&O insurance context, which I discuss below, but it arises in other contexts as well. Many types of claims, including general liability, …
On March 2, Auto-Owners Insurance Company dropped its Eleventh Circuit appeal of a Middle District of Florida decision granting summary judgment to its policyholder on defense and indemnity coverage for Chinese drywall liabilities. The district court’s opinion, authored by Judge Susan Bucklew in Tampa, denied Auto-Owners’ summary judgment motion seeking to avoid coverage obligations based on the pollution …
In my previous post on HB 245, I described the Florida legislature’s efforts to depopulate Citizens by allowing surplus lines carriers to pluck policies from Citizens. The legislation at the time allowed surplus lines insurers to take a policyholder out of Citizens unless that policyholder objected and opted out of the new surplus lines coverage. …
Let’s take a short break from the top 10 insurance myths series to discuss a recent Eleventh Circuit decision that might seem a bit puzzling at first. (Hat tip to my friend Dan Thomas, construction lawyer extraordinaire at Leopold Law, for sending me a copy of the opinion.) In Ruderman v. Washington National Insurance Corp., …
Let’s start with a little background. Since the McCarran-Ferguson Act was passed by Congress in 1945, the insurance industry largely has been exempt from federal regulation. That includes (with some limited exceptions) federal antitrust law. So things that most companies cannot do (for example, all major banks agreeing to offer the same paltry interest rates …
Last week I provided a list of my top 10 commercial insurance myths and misconceptions. Today I want to start with the first misconception on the list: Your Business Is “Fully Covered”. I hear this a lot from clients. From a liability standpoint, it usually means their company has a comprehensive general liability (CGL) policy …
Commercial insurance is complicated, and decisions regarding what insurance to buy and whether to assert or pursue an insurance claim frequently are based on false assumptions about what risks are covered. Below is a list of 10 of the most common misconceptions regarding commercial liability insurance. In the coming days, I will examine each of …
This is for the insurance defense lawyers out there, and the plaintiffs’ lawyers who love to make their lives miserable. One of my loyal readers in Jacksonville (my friend and former partner at Gunster, construction law guru Ed Whelan) sent me a copy of this January 5, 2012 order in a construction defect case in …
Another high-profile insurance bill, HB 245, passed an important first test in the Florida House yesterday. The bill is aimed at reducing Citizens’ policy count by shifting policies to surplus lines carriers. The Senate version is likely to face stiff opposition, although it seems to be on a trajectory to be one of the insurance …
A Florida House panel yesterday voted to scrap HB 427, the so-called bad faith reform bill that has been repeatedly rejected in various forms in the Florida House and Senate in recent years. Read the Orlando Sentinel’s story on the issue here. The basic premise of HB 427 and similar bills is to restrict bad …