UIM JURY VERDICT NOT RELEVANT TO BAD FAITH CASE BECAUSE IT OCCURRED AFTER THE INSURER HAD COMPLETED ITS CLAIM EVALUATION (Philadelphia Federal)
In this UIM bad faith case, the insureds demanded UIM policy limits which the insurer did not pay. The insureds took their case to trial, and the jury verdict far exceeded policy limits. The insureds pursued a claim for bad faith, arguing among other things that the jury verdict could be used as evidence of bad faith.
The court disagreed. Bad faith can only be determined based on the insurer’s conduct in evaluating the claim when it was submitted and on “the information available to the insurer during the claims processing”. The jury verdict was rendered after the insurer had done its claim evaluation. Thus, the jury verdict was not relevant to bad faith.
The central legal issue in the case was whether the insureds had executed some version of an enforceable UIM policy limit sign down, below their liability coverage. The court’s detailed analysis revealed that the insured’s application, which would otherwise have effected an enforceable sign down, was ineffective because it made that decision contingent on another required form that was only signed over one month later. The accident at issue occurred during the interim. The court found that there was no effective sign down, and the UIM limits defaulted to the liability limits, a difference between $300,000 and $750,000.
The insureds claimed that asking them to sign the second document constituted bad faith. The insurer consistently took the position that the second document was not necessary to succeed on the sign down argument; rather, the application controlled and the second document was basically redundant.
Magistrate Judge Rice disagreed with the carrier’s position on the application as stated above, but still found no bad faith:
“Nor does the failure to have [the insured] sign the UIM coverage selection form until [one month after the application] constitute bad faith. [The insurer] consistently maintained that the … application established the UIM policy limit, and the [insureds] had access to all relevant documents at all times. My post-trial disagreement with that determination fails to establish … bad faith.”
Date of Decision: February 18, 2020
Gibson v. State Farm Fire & Cas. Co., U.S. District Court Eastern District of Pennsylvania CIVIL ACTION No. 18-4919, 2020 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 27531 (E.D. Pa. Feb. 18, 2020) (Rice, M.J.)
