Insurance Coverage Services for Insurance Companies
Vedder Price provides a full range of legal services to the insurance industry, and included among its clients are insurers, brokers, agents, and adjusters, as well as insurance purchasing groups. The firm has represented insurance holding companies, self-insured clients, on-shore and off-shore captives, and insurance trusts on contractual, regulatory, negotiated, and litigated matters. In addition, we have represented insurers, brokers, consultants, and other industry participants in general business issues such as corporate structuring, contracting, taxation, risk management and underwriting policies and guidelines, labor, and employee benefits. The insurance practice at Vedder Price is dynamic and responsive, and represents a growing sector of the firm’s activities.
Counseling on and litigation of both simple and complex litigation matters are major aspects of our insurance practice. The firm has represented insurers in a broad scope of litigation, ranging from simple personal injury defense cases to multiparty declaratory judgment lawsuits involving complex issues of policy interpretation, at both the primary and excess levels. We have litigated on behalf of clients with respect to literally all facets of the substantive area of insurance coverage.
We are often engaged by insurers to defend policyholders under liability policies. Our defense experience includes defense of claims based on product liability (including mass tort claims involving toxic substances), professional negligence, CGL and premises liability, the Structural Work Act, and small, high-frequency claims such as “slip-and-fall” and other personal injury claims.
Insurance Coverage Litigation
Vedder Price provides a full range of legal services to the insurance industry, and included among its clients are insurers, brokers, agents and adjusters, as well as insurance purchasing groups. The firm has represented insurance holding companies, self-insured clients, on-shore and off-shore captives, and insurance trusts on contractual, regulatory, negotiated and litigated matters. In addition, we have represented insurers, brokers, consultants and other industry participants in general business issues, such as corporate structuring, contracting, taxation, risk management and underwriting policies and guidelines, labor and employee benefits. Coverage litigation on behalf of insurers is a major component of our insurance practice. We have substantial experience in declaratory judgment litigation, damage actions for claimed breach of policy obligations, “bad faith” litigation, class actions and other complex coverage litigation such as antitrust and RICO claims against insurers. We also have an extensive environmental coverage practice. Our attorneys also provide counseling, assistance in regulatory compliance and services such as in-house seminars for claims personnel.
Experience In a Broad Range of Coverage Areas
We have litigated on behalf of clients with respect to virtually every aspect of insurance coverage, including the following areas:
- Personal Injury Coverage – Including issues concerning coverage for civil rights actions, zoning cases, maternity leave class actions, wrongful termination and environmental cases.
- Health Care Coverage – Including issues concerning termination of coverage, expenses incurred and coverage for experimental procedures.
- Environmental Coverage – Including a national practice concerning all aspects of complex, multi-party environmental litigation and management of cases involving both comprehensive general liability policies and environmental liability policies for occurrence-based and claims-made coverages.
- Advertising Liability Coverage – Including issues concerning coverage for copyright and patent infringement, antitrust violations, securities fraud and banking institution failures.
- Business Risk Exclusions – Including issues concerning the applicability of exclusions to underlying cases filed nationwide involving items and products such as fire-retardant plywood, plastic piping and defective buildings.
- Additional Insured Coverage – Including issues concerning coverage for additional insureds and the relationship to indemnity agreements in the construction industry and in other commercial relationships with parties such as vendors and products distributors.
- Completed Operations and Products Liability Coverage – Including issues concerning the applicability of coverage to various types of claims, such as environmental claims.
- Excess Insurance – Including issues concerning vertical versus horizontal exhaustion, rights of excess insurers to challenge allocations and excess/primary relationships.
- First-Party Property Coverage – Including general issues, such as concurrent causation, as well as more specific issues relating to environmental claims.
- Personal Lines – Including issues concerning homeowners’ and automobile coverages. Representative homeowners’ issues handled by our firm involve coverage for real estate sales, assault and battery, trespass, nuisance, conversion, sexual harassment, sexual molestation and emotional distress claims. Representative automobile issues include coverage for uninsured and underinsured motorists’ claims and permissive driver issues.
- Asbestos Coverage Issues – Including bodily injury and property damage coverage under primary and excess policies and effect of insured’s bankruptcy.
- Class Actions – Including issues under both personal and commercial lines policies in both state and federal courts.
- Premium Recovery – Including both ordinary collection work and complex suits involving retro policies and numerous contested claims, along with related insolvency work. We have handled many discreet engagements and have also managed a large collection litigation program for a major insurer, including selection of regional and local counsel and monitoring and reporting of results.
- Reinsurance – Including extensive treaty language analysis and negotiation of large claims with reinsurers.
- Alternative Dispute Resolution – Including mediation, arbitration and other voluntary dispute resolution mechanisms. We participate actively in the work of the CPR Institute for Dispute Resolution, a major ADR organization. Members of the firm have also coordinated and prepared extensive coverage opinions involving personal lines of insurance (homeowners’ and auto) for a California insurer. We have developed an expertise in the law of eight western states, including California, on general issues relating to the duty to defend, independent counsel requirements and bad faith claims.
Training Sessions and Workshops
Our attorneys have conducted various training sessions and developed a practical guide for use by insurance personnel regarding drafting appropriate reservation of rights letters and on the proper coordination of additional insured matters among the claims, underwriting and marketing departments. We have also conducted workshops and lectured on issues to various entities and associations, such as the American Corporate Counsel Association, involving the drafting and interpretation of indemnity agreements and agreements to procure insurance from the perspective of both the corporate policyholder and the insurer.
Cost Containment and Fee Arrangements
We are sensitive and dedicated to efficient and cost effective representation, a primary concern of our insurance clients. Among cost-containment approaches to litigation, we provide early and ongoing litigation risk analysis and evaluation to assist in litigation management and resolution decisions. Our fee arrangements and billing practices are both highly competitive and flexible. We are pleased to work out special fee arrangements, including blended rate programs, retainer-volume discounts and other creative fee structures to suit the unique preferences of our insurance industry clients.
Excess and Reinsurance
We have substantial experience in litigation concerning excess carrier policy obligations, including issues such as partial policy period aggregate limits, claimed policy obligations owed to insured’s corporate parent, alleged “direct duty” of primary carrier to excess carrier with respect to failure to settle suit against insured, trigger of coverage, proof of exhaustion of primary limits, “drop down” issues arising out of excess carrier insolvencies, horizontal versus vertical exhaustion of primary limits and right of excess carriers to challenge allocations. We have also negotiated reinsurance claims and structured coverage litigation settlements to facilitate reinsurance recovery.
Insurance Antitrust/Unfair Trade Practice
The insurance industry is highly regulated and heavily engaged in joint ratemaking, trade association and other lawful activities. As a result, the insurance industry is often the target of private class and governmental actions in both federal and state courts claiming violations of antitrust, unfair or deceptive trade practices and other insurance statutes and regulations as well as RICO and similar claims. Our insurance litigation attorneys have provided legal representation in large complex class actions of this nature.
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