QUESTION OF FACT WHETHER A SPECIAL RELATIONSHIP EXISTED WHICH WOULD SUPPORT THE INSURANCE MALPRACTICE ACTION.

The Third Department, reversing Supreme Court, determined a question of fact had been raised whether a special relationship had developed between plaintiff (the insured) and plaintiff’s insurance agency (defendant Cardell), such that plaintiff could maintain an action for insurance malpractice. Plaintiff put on rodeos and procured insurance from defendant for each event. One policy mistakenly excluded coverage for injuries caused by animals. Another policy didn’t cover the trailers used to transport the rodeo animals. After the rodeo, a few animals escaped as they were about to be loaded onto trailers and injured several people. Both carriers disclaimed coverage. The court explained the law re: a special relationship between an insured and the insurance agency:

 

Although an insurance agent’s common-law duty to his or her clients does not include a continuing duty to advise the clients on appropriate coverage or to recommend additional coverage that the clients did not request …, an agent may be liable for failing to provide appropriate advice in circumstances where there is a special relationship. As pertinent here, such a relationship may arise when “there is a course of dealing over an extended period of time which would have put objectively reasonable insurance agents on notice that their advice was being sought and specially relied on” … . The question whether a special relationship exists between an insurance agent and a client giving rise to a duty to guide and advise the client is a factual determination that “is governed by the particular relationship between the parties and is best determined on a case-by-case basis” … . Here, plaintiff testified that he had purchased his business and personal insurance from defendant for at least six years, that he knew little about insurance and that he relied upon defendant to obtain the appropriate coverage for his rodeo operations. He stated that he had never seen any of the rodeo insurance policies that defendant procured on his behalf, that insurance certificates were the only documents ever provided to him, and that “with [Cardell] being my agent for years, I took that as he was representing me and making sure that I was covered.” As for the failure to include the trailer in the schedule of covered vehicles in plaintiff’s automobile insurance policy — which defendant had also procured — plaintiff stated that he understood that his trailers were covered by his truck insurance and that he was never advised that his trailers should be separately listed as covered vehicles until after the … incident. Finch v Steve Cardell Agency, 2016 NY Slip Op 01231, 3rd Dept 2-18-16

 

NEGLIGENCE (QUESTION OF FACT WHETHER DRIVER OF CITY TRUCK EXERCISED REASONABLE CARE DURING AN EMERGENCY STOP IN THE LEFT LANE OF A HIGHWAY)/MUNICIPAL LAW (QUESTION OF FACT WHETHER DRIVER OF CITY TRUCK EXERCISED REASONABLE CARE DURING AN EMERGENCY STOP IN THE LEFT LANE OF A HIGHWAY)/VEHCILE AND TRAIFFIC LAW (QUESTION OF FACT WHETHER DRIVER OF CITY TRUCK EXERCISED REASONABLE CARE DURING AN EMERGENCY STOP IN THE LEFT LANE OF A HIGHWAY)