Opinion Survey Evidences Public Skepticism Towards First Party Bad Faith Litigation
A majority of Americans believe that laws allowing people to sue their own auto insurance company for punitive damages, in addition to receiving benefits for their insured claim losses, are not a good idea.
New public opinion survey findings from the Insurance Research CouncilВ (IRC) indicate that 26 percent of those surveyed said that allowing such lawsuits was a poor idea, and 31 percent said it was only a fair idea.
The survey also asked whether respondents would be willing to pay more for insurance in order to allow first-party bad-faith lawsuits. Forty-seven percent said they were “not at all willing” to pay more and 24 percent said they were “not very willing” to pay more. Even among those who thought that allowing first-party bad-faith lawsuits was a good or an excellent idea, one-half (51 percent) said they were unwilling to pay more for insurance in order to allow the lawsuits.
July 29, 2010
Posted in: Blog