Insurance Disputes

Coverage disputes and policy interpretation

Most insurance fights start with a single question: does the policy cover this loss? We litigate that question across property, liability, and professional policies, and Washington law gives the policyholder real advantages. Insurance policies are construed as the average purchaser would understand them, ambiguities are read against the insurer that drafted them, and an exclusion is applied narrowly with the burden on the carrier to prove it. The insured proves the loss falls within coverage; the insurer proves any exclusion. When coverage is genuinely disputed, either side can ask a court to decide it through a declaratory-judgment action (RCW 7.24), which resolves the coverage question before the underlying loss compounds.

Insurance bad faith, IFCA, and the Consumer Protection Act

An insurer owes its policyholder a duty of good faith, and in Washington breaching it is a tort, not just a contract claim, which opens the door to damages well beyond the policy limit. A carrier that unreasonably denies or mishandles a claim can face common-law bad-faith liability (Coventry Associates v. American States), a Consumer Protection Act claim built on the state's claims-handling regulations (WAC 284-30), and, for a wrongful denial, treble damages and attorney fees under the Insurance Fair Conduct Act (RCW 48.30.015). These remedies change the leverage entirely: an insurer that could only ever owe the claim itself has far less reason to pay than one facing triple damages and fees.

Denied, delayed, and underpaid first-party claims

First-party claims, where you're collecting on your own policy, are where most bad-faith conduct happens: the denial with a thin explanation, the investigation that drags for months, the lowball offer on a property or business-interruption loss. We litigate wrongful denials, unreasonable delay, failure to investigate, and undervalued payments on property, business-interruption, and similar coverages. Where the dispute is really about the dollar value of a covered loss rather than coverage itself, many policies require appraisal, a faster valuation process we invoke or contest as the facts warrant. The throughline is holding the carrier to a prompt, fair, and fully investigated decision, which is exactly what the regulations require.

Duty to defend and liability coverage

For liability and third-party claims, the insurer's first obligation is the duty to defend, and in Washington that duty is broad: it arises if the complaint could conceivably trigger coverage, and it is far wider than the duty to actually indemnify. An insurer that doubts coverage must usually defend under a reservation of rights and seek a declaration, rather than simply refuse, because a carrier that wrongfully refuses to defend can be bound by the result and estopped from denying coverage (Truck Insurance Exchange v. VanPort Homes). We enforce the duty to defend, litigate reservation-of-rights and additional-insured disputes, and hold carriers to the consequences when they abandon an insured who was owed a defense.

Resolving the dispute, and who pays for it

Insurance disputes resolve in several ways, and we use whichever fits: a declaratory-judgment action to settle coverage, appraisal to fix the value of a covered loss, negotiation backed by the threat of bad-faith exposure, or trial. Washington adds a powerful lever for policyholders: under the Olympic Steamship doctrine, an insured forced to litigate to obtain the coverage it was owed can recover its attorney fees, and IFCA and the Consumer Protection Act add their own fee awards. That fee-shifting means a carrier's decision to fight a covered claim carries its own price, which is often what brings a stalled claim to resolution.