Allright, here’s another law review article, this time out of the Oklahoma Law Review by way of Workplace Prof, complaining about the standards of review currently applied by the courts to ERISA benefit denial cases. Although I haven’t yet read it – I just finished Langbein’s on the same topic, and I’m not ready
Bad Faith Litigation: Do the Numbers Add Up?
I am a little bit of a skeptic – I don’t think it has devolved yet to cynicism – when it comes to insurance bad faith litigation. Done right, a state law system of bad faith rules and rights can establish appropriate boundaries for all three sides of the insurance triangle – the insurer, the
The Unum Provident Problem
I have spent some time recently reading a draft version of Yale Professor John Langbein’s article, Trust Law as Regulatory Law: The Unum/Provident Scandal and Judicial Review of Benefit Denials under ERISA. For those of you who have more socially redeeming hobbies (like mowing the lawn, watching paint dry, pretty much just about anything I
Coastal Homeowners Insurance – Distorting the Market or a FAIR Complaint?
Here’s an interesting story today about the Massachusetts Attorney General challenging the rate increases that have been approved for the state’s homeowners’ insurer of last resort, the FAIR plan. The problem is one that is riling coastal homeowners’ insurance markets up and down the eastern seaboard, namely the rate increases being imposed by insurers –
Discovery of Reserves and Other Repetitive Events
Here is a nice post on whether claim reserves are discoverable in insurance coverage or bad faith litigation, with some case law on the topic as well. The discovery of claim reserve information is one of those issues that is a consistent point of dispute from one coverage or bad faith action to the next.
The Long Term Impact of Conflicted Decision Making in ERISA Litigation
I have talked elsewhere, including here and here, about the extent to which market forces can be expected to protect against conflicted decision makers in ERISA benefits litigation, and my preference for the position of courts such as the First Circuit, who recognize the central role such forces should play in devising the appropriate
Bad Faith Failure to Settle? Maybe, Maybe Not.
Well, this is an interesting report, and though I am not quite sure exactly what to make of it, it falls within the general rubric of this blog. As Robert Ambrogi sums the reporting and blogging on this story up here, a law firm has been hit with an eighteen million dollar malpractice verdict
Insurance Policy Interpretation and ERISA Conflict of Interests
Insurance coverage could learn a bit from the law of ERISA, particularly from the concept of structural conflicts of interest that is so much in play in ERISA litigation at the moment. In the world of insurance coverage litigation, insurers almost invariably stand in exactly the position that ERISA decisions view as a structural conflict:
Retirement Benefits and Fiduciary Duties under ERISA
There is a nice and complimentary write up of this blog at Workplace Prof Blog, one of my favorite sources for a wide range of information related to employee benefits, including ERISA, such as this post on a petition for writ of certiorari arising out of a recent Ninth Circuit ruling concerning the fiduciary
Choice of Law in Insurance Coverage Litigation
Lawyers today are specialists, as evidenced by the long list of single issue law blogs listed on the bottom left of this blog (for an explanation of that list, see here). And with specialization comes what I call “without a second thought” tools, which are approaches to practice that are second nature to those