How hard should a car insurance company try to keep a policy holder up to date? This is a situation that I find myself in currently, albeit much abbreviated: The insurance for our car was due to be renewed. Having not heard from the company, we logged into the on-line portal and saw "No action required, your policy will be renewed on XX/XX/XXXX". Assuming the company's own portal would be correct, we let it roll over (as we did the year before, without issue). Then, we got pulled over by the police for no insurance, so we re-checked the portal and it stated the same, No action required. We phoned up customer services and they (unhelpfully) said, "We sent you an e-mail [Which we never received] and we won't issue a Letter of Indemnity because we sent that [single] e-mail" We checked our inbox, we got all the monthly news updates, but no e-mail about renewal. So, now we're stuck with a producer that we cannot produce because their portal claimed we had to do nothing. My question is this: If an insurance company are not planning on renewing your policy because they "require more information", yet their own portal claims the opposite, how liable are they? Additional information: All other renewals we had with them, we got no correspondence until a week after the renewal date (when we received the digital and hard-copy certificate). We assumed it would be the same this year also. No payments have been missed, the last one being taken on the first of the month (3 days before the renewal date). They claim this is for the final month of the period covered by the old policy. They are refusing the Letter of Indemnity as they deem a single e-mail - without any attempted follow up by phone or mail - is sufficient to state intent (contrary to the portal) of not renewing. Also note that we proved this e-mail was never received by microsoft customer servers who kindly restored all deleted messages to ensure it wasn't a client error). UK law provides that drivers must be insured (see selected answer). Please let me know if any other information is required.
Although your question didn't ask about the criminal side of this, it's important to consider the offence of driving without insurance in the UK. Section 143 Road Traffic Act 1998 provides that— (1) Subject to the provisions of this Part of this Act— (a) a person must not use a motor vehicle on a road or other public place unless there is in force in relation to the use of the vehicle by that person such a policy of insurance or such a security in respect of third party risks as complies with the requirements of this Part of this Act ... (2) If a person acts in contravention of subsection (1) above he is guilty of an offence. (3) A person charged with using a motor vehicle in contravention of this section shall not be convicted if he proves— ... (c) that he neither knew nor had reason to believe that there was not in force in relation to the vehicle such a policy of insurance or security as is mentioned in subsection (1) above. If it's not too late, it may be worth challenging the matter in court on the basis of a s143(1)(c) defence (i.e. you didn't have reason to believe that your policy was not in force). You should speak to a solicitor immediately if you want to consider this. As mentioned in the previous answer, you may have a claim against the insurer if you can provide that you were misled into believing that your policy had been renewed automatically. You should read the terms and conditions carefully to discover whether they were entitled to communicate on matters of renewal solely by email. Again, you should speak to a solicitor to establish whether you have a realistic prospect of success. (in case you're curious, the 'security' mentioned in s143 refers to a sum of £500,000 which, if deposited with the Courts Funds Office, exempts an individual or corporation from the insurance requirement)
Your personal liability depends on your state law regarding the family car doctrine, so the answer there is "maybe" (Texas is not a state with that doctrine, so simple ownership of the car does not confer liability). You would be liable if your supervision of the child was negligent, which means approximately that you knew or should have known that she was a bad driver and would cause damage. Still, the insurance company is suppose to indemnify you (plural) against such loses, as long as they are legally required to do so. That would include many considerations, such as whether the driver was covered under the policy, whether the car was being used contrary to the terms of the policy (being used commercially), and so on. The insurance company is entitled to make a reasonable determination of whether they are responsible for the loss (and if so, to what extent). If they actually decline to cover the loss, you would need to sue them to make them comply with the terms of the policy (and your lawyer would give you a detailed explanation of why they are not liable, in case they aren't). The plaintiff works with his insurance company to recover his insured losses, and with his lawyer to recover any uninsured losses. His insurance company works with your insurance company, up to a point, and then the lawyers get involved. Your daughter does not work with his insurance company, and your insurance company probably has said something along the line "only talk to us". The insurance that a driver typically has may cover some of their own medical costs, but does not provide a payment for "pain and suffering": that is an uninsured loss. It is not generally required that drivers carry insurance to cover their own medical expenses – it is required that they insure against damages, in general, suffered by other parties (if the defendant is at fault). So there is probably nothing for the plaintiff to work out with his insurance company. In Texas, if the defendant is entirely at fault, defendant will be liable for 100% of plaintiff's damages. If defendant is 90% at fault, defendant will be liable for 90% of plaintiff's damages. If defendant is 49% at fault, defendant is not liable. Defendant can, in any event, also sue for damages, so if defendant is 49% at fault, defendant can recover 49% of her damages. The insurance companies might be able to talk it out and reach a clear resolution of the matter, but it could be more in their interest to throw the dice and work it out in court. One can always sue at the very start, and drop the suit if it becomes advantageous.
Main Question: Most likely not under Magnuson-Moss or U.C.C.. Question 1: If a charge payable before hand was not set forth in any written warranty, it is most likely not legal to deny remedy to the consumer. However, even if it was, it is possible that it would not meet the federal minimum standards for warranties as, per paragraph (d) a warranty has to provide for remedy without a charge. If there is absolutely no way for you to obtain the information to prove that a remedy is due — for e.g. no third party has legal or technical capacity to diagnose the vehicle — that is likely also a term to be found unconscionable and void, and may be found fraudulent, malicious and/or oppressive which may entitle one to collect punitive damages. (It is worth obtaining written confirmation of whether this decision is made in accord with their policies or on a line that they announce to be recorded) Question 2: Most likely same as Question 1. Question 3: Most likely same as Question 2. According to 15 U.S.C., subsection (a) of Section 2302 entitled &quot;Full and conspicuous disclosure of terms and conditions; additional requirements for contents: &quot;In order to improve the adequacy of information available to consumers, prevent deception, and improve competition in the marketing of consumer products, any warrantor warranting a consumer product to a consumer by means of a written warranty shall, to the extent required by rules of the Commission, fully and conspicuously disclose in simple and readily understood language the terms and conditions of such warranty. (4) A statement of what the warrantor will do in the event of a defect, malfunction, or failure to conform with such written warranty—at whose expense—and for what period of time.&quot; (5) A statement of what the consumer must do and expenses he must bear. (6) Exceptions and exclusions from the terms of the warranty. (7) The step-by-step procedure which the consumer should take in order to obtain performance of any obligation under the warranty, including the identification of any person or class of persons authorized to perform the obligations set forth in the warranty. (12) The characteristics or properties of the products, or parts thereof, that are not covered by the warranty. (13) The elements of the warranty in words or phrases which would not mislead a reasonable, average consumer as to the nature or scope of the warranty. It may, in addition to any or all of the above, be a violation of paragraph (8), (9), (10) and/or (11) based on specific fact patterns. To the 2nd point added: If the manufacturer stated that the vehicle would run at least a certain number of miles on a full charge for a certain number of miles driven or number of years, and did not stipulate it otherwise, they would have to remedy this. It is highly likely that they tried to evade making such written statement (if not written, it's not a warranty under Magnuson-Moss). If they did, and they did not define the scope of what they would have to do in the case of a defect or malfunction, they would have to remedy it by repairs within a reasonable time; if they fail, they would have to refund or replace. This does not mean that it is likely worth pursuing the matter in court other than maybe in small claims (See: ohwilleke's reply to this question for a general explanation). Moreover, most auto manufacturers put arbitration provisions in their sale contracts and/or their warranties and generally it may be required of one to opt out of it within 30 days of entering into the agreement. If that took place, first the dispute would likely need to be disputed through a qualified dispute resolution mechanism of the manufacturer, dealer, distributor and/or sellers choice depending on who gave the warranty. The specific State's lemon laws may provide for civil penalties for willful violations which may or may not be a very high bar to meet depending on the State's case law, and which is more likely to make it worth for &quot;lemon&quot; lawyers to take the case, but generally they are not a great deal more like hyenas of this segment of the law. It may still be worth considering for one depending on the specific facts, including State jurisdiction and the impeding nature of the nonconformity. (Please specify a State for the State's lemon laws applicable in this hypo)
There is a reasonable chance that the amount that you are borrowing and paying interest on is through a third party, so the dealer can't just waive the interest for the period when they are fixing the car. Legal responses would include canceling the sale, and suing for damages. The problem with suing for damages is that this isn't costing you an extra $15/day (the loan gets paid off at a fixed time, regardless of how much you get to actually drive the car). It would be a considerable stretch to argue that you were deprived of a week's worth of enjoyment for the car because of the wrongful acts of the dealer, and should be compensated. Your attorney would be in a good position to tell you, based on the facts and Texas law, whether that approach would be futile. The legality of the situation primarily depends on what the contract says. It is likely that the contract has clauses that maximally disclaim responsibility to the maximum extent allowed by law. There will be some clause that says something about taking delivery of the car, so you can check whether they have breached the contract on that point: it is possible that there is some escape hatch like "as soon as possible, upon receipt of payment". It seems pretty clear that they concealed a material fact, in order to induce you to buy the car. For example, the manufacturer may have installed a defective veblitzer which had to be replaced, and a reasonable person would not buy a car with a defective veblitzer, thus the veblitzer is a material fact. Or: the veblitzer may have been damaged in a flood. The fact that the car is, by their representation, not safe to drive in its current state, the mind of fact that would push most people into the "no thanks" category. To pursue the fraud angle, you need to be more specific about the defective part in your complaint. The only way to force them to reveal the nature of the missing part is to sue them and compel disclosure of the relevant facts during discovery. Again, your attorney would deal with this. You should bear in mind that if the sale is simply cancelled, you may not be able to recover the loan application or processing fee, and the trade-in will no doubt have been sold, so you can't get the old car back. There are laws against deceptive trade practices which might be applicable, depending on whether they said anything deceptive in their disseminated advertising. Section 17.46 may be applicable, if they patched the car together temporarily with a counterfeit veblitzer.
While German law indeed requires providing correct contact information it does not require the recipient to answer queries. It is there so that you can submit legal notifications. In your case I wouldn't be so sure that the information is not correct. However, even if the contact information is incorrect, there is not much you can do about it. This is reserved to the following groups by § 8 Abs. 3 UWG: every competitor; associations with legal personality which exist for the promotion of commercial or of independent professional interests, so far as a considerable number of entrepreneurs belong thereto, and which distribute goods or services of the same or similar type on the same market, provided such associations are actually in a position, particularly in terms of their personnel, material and financial resources, to pursue the tasks, under their memoranda of association, of promoting commercial or independent professional interests, and so far as the contravention affects the interests of their members; qualified entities that prove that they are entered on the list of qualified entities pursuant to section 4 of the Injunctions Act or on the list of the Commission of the European Communities pursuant to Article 4 of Directive 98/27/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council of 19 May 1998 on injunctions for the protection of consumer interests (OJ Number L 166 page 51); Chambers of Industry and Commerce or Craft Chambers. Unless you are a competitor you are out of luck. The hoster or other providers can't do anything and don't need to, as they are not required to check legality of their user's websites. It doesn't really matter where you are by the way for these laws.
Suppose Bob gets a typical term life insurance policy and pays the premiums through the contestability period. . . . If Bob elects not to receive any such treatments and, as a result, dies of this illness in the policy's term, does the insurer have grounds to deny or reduce the claim? No. This is not one of the reasons that an insurance company is allowed to refuse to pay a death benefit when an insurance policy has become incontestable. Once premiums have been paid through the contestability period, the only grounds upon which the insurer may deny or reduce the claim are: Bob isn't actually dead. A life insurance company almost never disputes this issue if it is presented with an apparently authentic death certificate, and it routinely requires claimants to provide it with a death certificate if it doesn't already have one in its file. But, if Bob walked into the insurance company's office alive and well, with his own death certificate, and handed it to the claims adjuster for the insurance company, the insurance company wouldn't write him a check. After the contestability period expired, Bob stopped paying the premium, was given a warning that the policy would terminate or have a reduced premium if he didn't pay the premium by the end of the grace period for doing so, and he didn't pay the premium. In the case of a term life policy this failure to pay would result in the insurance company having no obligation to pay the benefit. In the case of a whole life policy that has not already had all premiums contemplated by the policy paid in full, failure to pay the premium will usually only reduce the amount of the benefit that is payable by the insurance company upon death relative to what it would have been if the premium had been paid in full. Bob has transferred the policy to someone else who will be entitled to the benefit instead (e.g. in a viatical settlement or a transfer of the policy to an ex-spouse or trust). Bob died after the life insurance policy expires for reasons other than non-payment of a premium (usually because the death happens at an age older than the age covered by the policy). For example, my life insurance policy has a provision that states that no life insurance benefit is payable and the policy terminates upon my 75th birthday. This reduces the premium I pay and isn't a concern to me because after I'm that old I won't need to make up for any lost income in order to provide for my children. Another kind of life insurance policy that doesn't always pay a benefit when the insured dies is a "second to die" policy that pays a premium only when both of the insureds (typically a husband and wife who anticipate a large estate tax liability at a second death) have died. Bob had an accidental death policy rather than a plain vanilla life insurance policy. In this case, Bob's death from a terminal illness would not be considered accidental unless, for example, he actually died because a tornado hit the hospital he was in before he died from his terminal illness. What constitutes an accidental death is sometimes the subject of litigation. The whole point of an incontestability clause (which typically makes the policy not subject to contest after one to two years) is to prevent life insurance companies from refusing to pay a death benefit in situations including those like the one described in the question. Generally speaking, state law requires that life insurance policies to be incontestable after one to two years. An incontestable policy can also generally not be contested on the grounds that misrepresentations were made in the application for the life insurance policy, and preventing refusals to pay benefits in these situations is the other main reason that life insurance policies become incontestable. Note that even in the case of an accidental death policy, after the incontestability period expires, the life insurance company may not refuse to pay a benefit on the basis of fraud in the life insurance application. Once an accidental death policy is incontestable, the only reason the insurance company may refuse to pay a premium other than the reasons that apply to any other life insurance policy (as described above) is that the death was not accidental. Because it doesn't cover all possible deaths of the insured, accidental death policies are generally very inexpensive relative to the size of the benefit, compared to term life policies covering the same period of time for the same insured. Also, even if the insurance policy was still contestable, the insurance company could not refuse to pay the death benefit if Bob had been truthful in his insurance application at the time that it was made and Bob had kept his premiums current through the date of his death. For example, if Bob applied for his life insurance policy in January and answered every question on his application truthfully thinking that he was healthy, his application was approved in February, he was diagnosed with a terminal illness in March, and refused treatment and then died in April, the insurance company would not have a right to refuse to pay his death benefit, although in that situation, the insurance company would probably conduct an in depth investigation before agreeing to pay the death benefit. One of the reasons that the law doesn't allow insurance companies to refuse to pay in these situations is that (1) everyone dies eventually, so dying sooner only modestly adjusts the timing of when the benefit gets paid, and (2) the vast majority of people try to stay alive, even when there will be a death benefit payable when they die, if there is any realistic chance of doing so. Therefore, the economic cost to the insurance company of allowing some people to decline medical treatment when faced with a potentially deadly illness is very modest. The contestability period only exists at all to prevent people from applying for life insurance policies and lying about their lack of a known terminal illness when they apply for life insurance, which would allow people to avoid paying a life time of premiums and still receiving a life insurance benefit. But, since a terminal illness is pretty much defined as something that is expected to cause you death in six months or less, a year or two of contestability is usually sufficient to prevent this potential loophole from being exploited by unscrupulous terminally ill people.
If I may paraphrase the scenario: The customer has a contract with the insurer The customer is contemplating undergoing a certain procedure and is unsure if it is covered under the contract The customer calls the insurer to ask this specific question The insurer says "yes" The customer undergoes the procedure The insurer refuses to pay on the ground that it is not covered under the contract. Let's put aside issues of evidence and what can be proved and assume these facts are not in dispute. There is no question that the contract has been renegotiated; it hasn't. This avoids the necessity of considering if the insurer's employee has the authority to do this or it the customer can rely that they do even if they don't. There are two possibilities: The procedure is covered and the insurer must pay under contract The procedure isn't covered and the insurer must pay under the tort of negligent misstatement. The insurer is vicariously liable for the actions of its employee. The insurer owes a duty of care to a customer who asks such a question to answer it correctly. It is foreseeable that the customer would act on the insurer's advice and incur costs that they may have avoided if the correct advice had been given. Nothing is ever certain in the law but this is as close as you can get.
The CEO, with his lawyer have tried to convince me that this only apply to current client and any past clients that I have work on. Is this true? No. It will be true only if they make that clarification in the clause or a properly added amendment. The clause currently has no indication that it is limited to "current client and any past clients that [you] have work[ed] on". The CEO's &amp; lawyer's refusal to amend the clause so as to make it consistent with their attempts [to persuade you] would be a red flag. Their inconsistent representations to you suggest that they are not planning to honor the covenant of good faith on which all contracts are premised. Should I expect the CEO to offer a fair contract or is this something you read and negotiate? You should require a contract that seems fair to you. And by "to you" I mean that it has to be in line with your expectations regardless of the average conditions in the labor market. Negotiations are not binding. They are merely a preamble to a contract, and that contract is binding. This is why you should reject a contract that falls short of your requirements. Some clauses are unlawful and/or void and unenforceable as unconscionable or for contravening legislation (unlawful clauses can and do arise even if drafted by attorneys). Thus, although you might not have to worry about those clauses in particular, the company's mere attempt to include them in a contract should alert you of the high risk of ending up with other abusive terms &amp; conditions which are binding and enforceable nonetheless.