Property

Expert Analysis

• Courts Should Defer To Science On COVID-19 Physical Loss

  

  As litigation of pandemic-related business interruption claims continues nationwide, the insurance carriers and courts adopting the most conservative interpretation of "physical loss or damage" — the basic trigger for business interruption coverage — are making erroneous assumptions about a complex physical phenomenon, says Micah Skidmore at Haynes and Boone.

• The Murky World Of Legal Rankings Gets Some Clarity In NJ

  

  New Jersey's new, stringent approach to legal rankings will make accolade advertising more transparent, benefiting both attorneys and clients and offering legal marketers a new set of best practices amid evolving standards, say Penny Paul at Lowenstein Sandler and Susan Peters at Greybridge.

• Embracing ESG: Cigna Counsel Talks Employee Wellness

  

  Building employee well-being into corporate environmental, social and governance priorities required our legal team to focus more closely on cross-functional collaboration within the company and increased communication with our board of directors and shareholders, says Julia Brncic at Cigna.

• Hybrid Work Models Are Key To Gender Parity In Law Firms

  

  To curb the historically high rates of attrition among female lawyers, Roberta Liebenberg at Fine Kaplan and Stephanie Scharf at Scharf Banks suggest firms must normalize hybrid work schedules, and they recommend best practices to promote engagement among all attorneys, regardless of where they work.

• An Insurer's Guide To Policyholder Bankruptcy

  

  Given the increased likelihood of policyholders filing bankruptcy petitions in the wake of the pandemic, insurance professionals must be aware of five basic principles when dealing with an insured in bankruptcy, says Eric Fitzgerald at Goldberg Segalla.

• Attorneys Beware: Zoom Depositions Are Likely Inadmissible

  

  As legal proceedings have moved online in light of the pandemic, lawyers may mistakenly believe that recorded Zoom video depositions can be entered as evidence, but without certain safeguards, the testimony is unlikely to be accepted by courts, says Phillip Zisook at Schoenberg Finkel.

• NJ Policyholders Could Still See Recovery For COVID Losses

  

  Although New Jersey state and federal courts have decided the majority of dispositive motions in COVID-19 business interruption insurance cases in favor of insurers, policyholders retain a plausible path to recovery depending on the nature of their loss and the precise policy language at issue, say Lee Epstein and Matthew Goldstein at Flaster Greenberg.

• COVID Rulings May Support Ransomware Insurance Denials

  

  A recent spate of pandemic-related insurance decisions — where federal courts found that a temporary inability to use property doesn't qualify as physical loss or damage for coverage purposes — may be used as favorable precedent by cyber insurers denying ransomware loss claims for temporary inability to access data, say Thomas Caswell and Peter Kelly Golfman at Zelle.

• 3 Risk Management Lessons From Pandemic Insurance Wars

  

  As appellate decisions in COVID-19 business interruption insurance claims continue to clarify the state of the law, there are some things that policyholders' lawyers and risk managers can do in the meantime to help prepare for future unforeseen events affecting coverage, says Peter Halprin at Pasich.

• Why Legacy Insurance May Not Protect Adopters Of Bitcoin

  

  Evidenced by El Salvador's adoption of the Bitcoin standard this week, there is an emerging need for insurance products to cover the risk of owning and holding the digital asset, as it may not fall into the protected categories in legacy insurance products, say attorneys at Mound Cotton.

• Ill. BIPA Ruling Marks Critical Win For Silent Cyber Coverage

  

  The Illinois Supreme Court's recent decision in West Bend Mutual v. Krishna Schaumburg Tan, confirming that commercial general liability policies do not have to include specific language to cover claims under the Biometric Information Privacy Act, represents a critical victory for policyholders, but leaves unresolved issues in the battle over BIPA coverage, says Tae Andrews at Miller Friel.

• NY Badly Needs Bad Faith Bill To Hold Insurers Accountable

  

  Contrary to a recent Law360 guest article that contends New York state's insurance reform bill would unfairly tip the scales against insurers, Edward Steinberg at the New York State Trial Lawyers Association argues the law is necessary to hold insurers accountable for acting in bad faith, and would protect policyholders and injured parties alike.

• Insurers Have Cause For Optimism In Labor Cost Rulings

  

  Recent decisions from the high courts of South Carolina and North Carolina — holding that embedded labor costs can be depreciated from the replacement cost of property — bolster insurers’ moderate edge in these disputes and point to important implications for both insureds and insurers, says Richard Mason at MasonADR.