This morning I read a story about a hot shot lawyer who was able to get one over on an insurance carrier. Now, while I may work in the insurance industry, there’s something so satisfying about seeing a giant corporation lose because of a simple loophole. In this case, a little less David and Goliath, a little more Ferris Bueller’s day off. Hopefully everyone reading this is old enough to know and appreciate Bueller’s accomplishments, but I digress.

This lawyer, who was fairly successful in his own right, was a big-time cigar smoker. He loved to get home after a long day of nothing but paperwork and enjoy a nice drink and cigar. Golf courses, nights out, celebrations- all accompanied with a cigar. He got the opportunity to buy a very rare set of expensive Nicaraguan Cigars. Obviously, being a lawyer, the guys pretty smart. He’d heard of people getting insurance on some wacky things in the past, so he decided to see if he could insure these cigars. Great idea.

I’m a huge advocate of not only properly protecting your valuables physically, but also financially. If it cost what is a lot of money to you, insure it. Anyways, he finds a carrier who will sell him insurance on these cigars, he pays whatever it costs and goes on his way. A few months later, and about a dozen rounds of golf later, he files a claim with the insurance company that states his cigars had “Succumb to a series of small fires”. The insurance carrier, knowing what he was trying to do, denied the claim immediately and sent him on his way.

Too bad it wasn’t that simple.

This lawyer had read through his policy contract so carefully he found that, while fires were covered in the policy, it made no mention as to the type or size of fire that would be covered. He sued the Insurance Carrier and the judge made them pay the lawyers claim.

Moral of the story: It’s better to cover something that doesn’t need it than to not cover something that does.

As always, give me a call if you have any questions about your current policies, even if it’s not with us.

Your Agent,

Drake Harness

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