Appraisal panels have few guidelines to comply with about what they will and can’t contemplate in figuring out the quantity of the loss. In a case just lately determined,1 a policyholder refused to proceed in an appraisal as a result of the panel was offered proof of a subsequent loss. The policyholder argued that this breached the appraisal settlement.
The appellate court docket held:
On enchantment, Guzy acknowledges that to ‘measure the amount only of the covered loss required intentional knowledge of and exclusion of the second loss.’ Nonetheless, Guzy maintains that the appraisal settlement ‘prohibited’ consideration of the second loss proof. Guzy’s place seems to be that the appraisal settlement each required the appraisal course of to separate out the harm attributable to the 2 losses and prohibited solely consideration of the second loss.
We don’t agree with this absurd end result. The appraisal settlement requires that the ‘Award of Appraisal’ shall not contemplate harm attributable to different occasions. As a matter of logic, to make sure that the award solely lined harm attributable to the November 2016 leak, the appraisal course of essentially should contemplate different potential causes for the harm claimed. As a matter of regulation, the Florida Supreme Court has said that ‘an assessment of the amount of a loss’ essentially features a willpower ‘whether or not the requirement for a repair or replacement was caused by a covered peril or a cause not covered.’ State Farm Fire & Cas. Co. v. Licea, 685 So. second 1285, 1288 (Fla. 1996). Guzy’s studying of the appraisal settlement contravenes this fundamental precept and is implausible.
The appraisal settlement thus required the appraisal course of to find out the extent of the harm attributable to the November 2016 loss, moderately than any subsequent loss occasion….
This is smart to me. Why ought to the panel award damages for occasions that occurred earlier than or after the one which is the topic of appraisal?
Thought For The Day
The will to win, the need to succeed, the urge to achieve your full potential… these are the keys that may unlock the door to private excellence.
—Confucius
1 Guzy v. QBE Specialty Ins. Co., No. 22-cv-10668 (11th Cir. Feb. 2, 2023).