The New York Insurance Department’s (“NYID”) Office of General Counsel (“OGC”) recently issued an OGC Opinion (No. 09-06-08) representing the position of the NYID in respect of four distinct queries regarding the recent amendment to Insurance Law § 3420, which we have closely followed and written about in this blog. (See, e.g., here, here, here and here.)  Each issue addressed by this Opinion will be discussed in a separate blog post.  (See here, here and here for the other issues addressed in the OGC Opinion).

The first issue addressed by the OGC was whether the recent amendments to Insurance Law § 3420 (which require, among other things, an insurer to establish prejudice as a predicate to disclaiming coverage on late notice grounds) also apply to policies issued in New York but delivered in another state where the statute states that it applies to “any liability policy issued or delivered in this state.”

The OGC answered that question in the affirmative, stating that “[t]he term ‘issued or delivered in this state’ includes policies issued in New York but delivered outside of the state.”  The OGC’s interpretation was informed by an OGC Opinion from 1959, which distinguished between language previously used in the insurance law applying to policies “delivered or issued for delivery in this state.”

Click here to read the OGC Opinion.