Coverage & Claims

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Edwards Angell Palmer & Dodge’s Insurance and Reinsurance Department recently published its latest Newsletter, Insurance & Reinsurance Review – March 2011, which contains nine articles about various topics in the insurance and reinsurance industry. …
Read More Insurance & Reinsurance Review – March 2011

In the case of Melinda Holdings SA v Hellenic Mutual War Risks Association (Bermuda) Ltd [2011] EWHC 181 (Comm) Hellenic provided Melinda with a war risks policy in relation to its vessel the SILVA (the War Risks Policy). That ship was arrested by the Port Suez Court in Egypt in December 2008 and, at the time of judgment, remains there. SILVA had been seized by the Port Suez Court in an effort to recover a fine levied on another vessel in 1996. …
Read More UK: English Court Finds Egyptian Court Knowingly Relied on Forged Documents to Recover Fine

In Aviva Insurance Limited v Roger George Brown [2011] EWHC 362 QB, Mr Justice Eder was asked to consider a claim by Aviva for the recovery of sums it had paid to an insured under a home insurance policy (the Policy) on the basis that the paid claims were fraudulent. …
Read More UK: English Court Considers Recovery by an Insurer of Sums Paid on Account of a Fraudulent Claim

Kenneth Feinberg, the administrator of BP PLC’s $20 billion claim fund, recently stated that it is too soon to say whether liability payments related to the Deepwater Horizon disaster will end up exhausting all of the $20 billion BP set aside for all claims. …
Read More Deepwater Horizon Disaster: How’s BP’s $20 Billion Claim Fund Holding Up?

A Massachusetts federal court recently held that a party’s lapse in reporting a multi-million dollar and complex lawsuit deprived an insurer of the right to associate and was prejudicial as a matter of law, precluding coverage. …
Read More Massachusetts Federal Court Finds That Late Notice, Deprivation of the Right to Associate, Precludes Coverage

In the recent case of Sharon’s Bakery (Europe) Ltd v (1) AXA Insurance UK PLC (2) Aviva Insurance Ltd [2011] EWHC 210 (Comm), the High Court was asked to consider whether the defendant insurers were entitled to avoid an insurance policy on the grounds of material non-disclosure by the claimant, Sharon’s Bakery, and whether all benefit under the policy had been forfeited due to the use of fraudulent means or devices to promote the claim. …
Read More UK: High Court Considers Whether False Invoices Used to Obtain Financing Entitles Insurer to Avoid Policy

In two separate cases, federal courts have upheld the carrier’s denial of coverage for claims by an employer alleging that the insured induced a breach of their former employee’s employment contract. …
Read More Courts Find That Employment Claims Are Excluded By Contractual Liability Exclusions

The Massachusetts Appeals Court recently held that an insurer’s refusal to pay any fees incurred by independent counsel hired by the insured was in bad faith, but also held that the insurer was only liable for reasonable fees that the insured actually paid, not counsel’s full rate. …
Read More Massachusetts Appeals Court Finds Insurer In Bad Faith In Fee Dispute

In Global Process Systems Inc v Syarikat Takaful Malaysia Berhad [2011] UKSC 5, the Supreme Court unanimously upheld the Court of Appeal’s decision (previously reported here) that the appellant insurer was not entitled to rely on an exclusion for inherent vice contained within the contract as the proximate cause of the loss in question was a “peril of the sea”, not the nature of the subject matter insured. …
Read More UK: Supreme Court confirms narrow scope of inherent vice exclusions