BUSINESS INSURANCE ALERT ON COVID-19: Immediate 3-Step Insurance Strategy for Coronavirus Losses
As part of NAAOP’s ongoing effort to help inform our O&P members and friends on efforts to combat the COVID-19 virus, we have partnered with Miller, Friel, a business insurance law firm in Washington, DC, to help assist the O&P profession. We pass along this important alert which offers O&P practices, manufacturers, and suppliers a step-by-step approach to filing a business insurance claim for COVID-19 losses.
Please take the time to read the article linked below and follow the three steps outlined by my friend and colleague, Brian Friel. His law firm, Miller Friel, has agreed to co-host with NAAOP a webinar in the near future to answer O&P provider questions about filing business insurance claims for COVID-19 losses. More details will follow. Thank you.
Peter Thomas General Counsel, NAAOP
Dear Valued Client,
We wanted to send you a quick note to let you know what we have been doing for our clients with respect to Insurance Recovery of Coronavirus Losses. We are advising our clients to follow a three step strategy using a red light/green light approach:
Review relevant policies. For most businesses this will include Property and Business Income policies (Property/BI policies). If also purchased, pollution-specific policies (PLL) are also relevant.
Review and characterize policies as either red light or green light policies. Red light policies are those that contain a bacteria/virus or communicable disease exclusion. Green light policies are all others.
Immediately provide notice of claims to insurers for all green light policies. Most Property/BI policies require notice “as soon as practicable” from date of loss. The clock on this has already started, so action is required.
There is a lot of misinformation out there concerning coverage for coronavirus claims, particularly from insurance companies. We hope that this 3-step strategy helps, and we stand ready to assist you in this time of crisis. We look forward to hearing from you. In the meantime, please be safe.
Best regards, Brian G. Friel Miller Friel, PLLC