Fair Presentation of the Risk and Waiver- Latest from Scotland on the Insurance Act 2015

Last year we commented on Young v. Royal and Sun Alliance plc [2019] CSOH 32 which was the first case to be decided under the Insurance Act (IA) 2015. The Scottish appeal court (Inner House, Court of Session) has recently upheld the first instance decision [2020] CSIH 25.

Let us remind our readers the facts of the case briefly. The co-assureds (Mr Young and Kaim Park Investments Ltd, a company of which Mr Young was a director) brought a claim of £ 7.2 million for extensive fire damage to commercial premises insured. The insurer, Royal and Sun Alliance plc, rejected the claim on the basis that the assured failed to disclose material information in breach of the duty of fair presentation under the Insurance Act (IA) 2015. The policy had been entered through an insurance broker. The assured was requested by the insurance broker to fill in a proposal form which was prepared using the broker’s software. One part of the proposal form required the proposer to select from various options in a drop-down menu. The instruction read: “Select any of the following that apply to any proposer, director or partner of the Trade or Business or its Subsidiary Companies if they have ever, either personally or in any business capacity: …” The drop-down menu that followed this instruction included an option that any of the persons identified had been declared bankrupt or insolvent. Neither Mr Young nor Kaim Park Investments had been declared bankrupt or insolvent, however, Mr Young had previously been a director of four other companies which had entered into insolvency. The option which was selected on the proposal form was “None”. Accordingly, the proposal forwarded to the insurer showed the option selected, i.e. “None”, and the list of persons to which the declaration related. Once receiving the presentation, the insurer sent an e-mail to the brokers providing a quote for cover and a list of conditions. The conditions, inter alia, included: “Insured has never been declared bankrupt or insolvent.

Before the commercial judge, Lady Wolffe, the assured’s argument was that the insurer’s e-mail response amounted to a waiver by the insurer of its right to receive the undisclosed information regarding the four insolvent companies. Section 3(5)(e) of the IA stipulates that the assured is not required to disclose a circumstance “if it is something as to which the insurer waives information.”

It needs to be stressed that the introduction of the IA 2015 does not alter the legal position with regard to waiver established by case law pre-dating the 2015 Act. On that basis, with reference to Doheny v. New India Assurance Co [2005] 1 All ER (Comm) 382, the commercial judge indicated that waiver could be established in a case where the insurer had asked a “limiting question” such that the assured could reasonably infer that the insurer had no interest in knowing information falling outwith the scope of the question. The classic example is where the proposal form asks about convictions within the last 5 years and which can instruct waiver of information about convictions more than 5 years ago. This was not held to be the case here and accordingly it was held that there was no waiver on the part of the insurer with regard to the information not fully disclosed (i.e. the involvement of Mr Young in four insolvent companies).

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The assured appealed. The main argument brought forward by the assured was that by showing that it was interested in one aspect of Mr Young’s experience of insolvency, the insurer had impliedly demonstrated that it was not interested in others, and, therefore restricted Mr Young’s duty of disclosure. The Court of Session indicated that the commercial judge successfully identified relevant legal principles in that to found implied waiver of the insurer of this nature it is necessary to show that it made an inquiry directing the assured to provide certain information but no other information. This means that the appeal turned on the construction of a single email sent by the insurer to the brokers when providing a quote (during the pre-contractual stage). The Inner Court found that there was nothing in the email that amounted to an inquiry. Essentially, the insurers were responding to the broker’s request to provide a quotation based on the information provided. The response of the insurers in the relevant email was, therefore, an offer to insure on a variety of terms and conditions. It was not an inquiry and did not amount to limited concern of Mr Young’s past experience of insolvency that excluded the undisclosed information from which he was required to disclose for fair presentation of the risk. The insurer was accordingly entitled to avoid the policy.

It is hard to suggest that the case establishes any novel point with regard to “implied waiver” of the duty of disclosure on the part of the assured by the insurer. Although, this is a Scottish case, it is very much in line with the pre-Act English law authorities and essentially turns on the impression an insurer’s response to a disclosure might create on the mind of a reasonable assured. If it can be said that insurer’s answer amounts to an inquiry (judged from the perspective of a reasonable assured) there could be a possibility of arguing that the relevant assured could infer that the insurer had no interest in knowing information falling outside the scope of that inquiry. Otherwise, there will be no issue of waiver by asking “limiting questions”. The judgment is obviously not binding on English courts but one suspects that it is one that will be referred to not only because it is the first case under the IA 2015 but also as it relies on principles developed by English courts pre-dating the IA 2015 which obviously remain relevant at least in the context of establishing “waiver of disclosure” by the insurer.

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Professor Barış Soyer

Professor Soyer was appointed a lecturer at the School of Law, Swansea University in 2001 and was promoted to readership in 2006 and professorship in 2009. He was appointed Director of the Institute of Shipping and Trade Law at the School of Law, Swansea in October 2010. He was previously a lecturer at the University of Exeter. His postgraduate education was in the University of Southampton from where he obtained his Ph.D degree in 2000. Whilst at Southampton he was also a part-time lecturer and tutor. His principal research interest is in the field of insurance, particularly marine insurance, but his interests extend broadly throughout maritime law and contract law. He is the author of Warranties in Marine Insurance published by Cavendish Publishing (2001), and an impressive list of articles published in elite Journals such as Lloyd’s Maritime and Commercial Law Quarterly, Berkley Journal of International Law, Journal of Contract Law and Journal of Business Law. His first book was the joint winner of the Cavendish Book Prize 2001 and was awarded the British Insurance Law Association Charitable Trust Book Prize in 2002, for the best contribution to insurance literature. A new edition of this book was published in 2006. In 2008, he edited a collection of essays published by Informa evaluating the Law Commissions' Reform Proposals in Insurance Law: Reforming Commercial and Marine Insurance Law. This book has been cited on numerous occasions in the Consultation Reports published by English and Scottish Law Commissions and also by the Irish Law Reform Commission and has been instrumental in shaping the nature of law reform. In recent years, he edited several books in partnership with Professor Tettenborn: Pollution at Sea: Law and Liability, published by Informa in 2012; Carriage of Goods by Sea, Land and Air, published by Informa in 2013 and Offshore Contracts and Liabilities, published by Informa Law from Routledge in 2014. His most recent monograph, Marine Insurance Fraud, was published in 2014 by Informa Law from Routledge. His teaching experience extends to the under- and postgraduate levels, including postgraduate teaching of Carriage of Goods by Sea, Transnational Commercial Law, Marine Insurance, Admiralty Law and Oil and Gas Law. He is one of the editors of the Journal of International Maritime Law and is also on the editorial board of Shipping and Trade Law and Baltic Maritime Law Quarterly. He currently teaches Admiralty Law, Oil and Gas Law and Marine Insurance on the LLM programme and also is the Head of the Department of Postgraduate Legal Studies at Swansea.

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