Construction Insurance Bulletin

Injuries sustained in the workplace present problematic issues for both the employer as well as the injured employee. Of the many types of work-related injuries, back injuries are the most commonly reported malady to Workers Compensation carriers.

A back injury can cost a company thousands of dollars due to such incidents. Missed work for doctor appointments and recovery time account for a large majority of financial losses that might occur.

Types of Work-Related Back Injuries
The most common type of back-injury complaint is that of the lower back. Nearly a million employees per year in the United States alone have reported lost work days due to lower back injury. Spine ailments, such as strains or sprained muscles, account for a great number of disability claims, especially in the field of construction and manual labor. The greater the physical demand of the work, the higher the rate of back injuries.

Although the pain and suffering of the worker who experiences a back injury might seem obvious, the employer is left to deal with the pains of financial loss due to the absence of the employee as well as the Workers Compensation costs. Neither party benefits in any way from an injury of such magnitude. In short, both sides are faced with long-term issues related to the back injury. Companies feel the financial aftershocks of workforce injuries in the amount of $13.4 billion per year.

Back Injury Prevention in the Workforce
Although the effects of job-related back injuries are readily known, the causes and how to prevent such injuries should take center stage for both employers and employees. Many companies offer in-house training and courses to help educate management and workers on how to avoid back injuries. A common program found in many companies is an injury prevention course that promotes safe work habits, such as:

• Proper lifting procedures
• Maximum weight guidelines
• Training on lifting equipment such as dollies and carts
• Proper access to storage equipment to promote easier lifting

Another preventative measure that might facilitate back injury prevention is a company incentive program for workers. Through these types of programs, the worker is offered a bonus for safety and injury-free work. Not only do programs such as these benefit the worker, the employer ultimately will deal less with the problems related to back injuries by implementing such programs.

Aside from the ill effects and prevention ideas presented, employers would do well to also avoid taking a disbelieving stance in response to an employee who might have sustained a back injury. Although it’s possible to feign such an injury, most workers who claim to have acquired an injury are not attempting to deceive their employer. Proper steps must continue to be taken to ensure the health and welfare of both the company and its workers.

A contractor gets a job to install the systems that will control the bank of eight elevators in a new 20-story hotel. The contractor obtains the components from the distributor, installs them without any problems, and moves onto the next job. However, prior to opening, the hotel’s owners find that none of the elevators are working. Diagnosing and repairing the problem will delay the hotel’s opening by at least two weeks and possibly more. The owners sue the general contractor who built the hotel and hired the sub; the GC in turn sues the sub. The sub submits a claim to its Liability insurance company, but the company denies coverage.

The same subcontractor gets an identical job for a new apartment building. This time, the elevators work during testing, but two months after the building opens, they grind to a halt between floors. An investigation reveals damage to the wiring leading from the control panels; the inspectors determine that the control panels short-circuited, causing a power surge that damaged the wires and shut down the elevators. Again, lawsuits follow and the sub forwards the claim to its insurance company. This time, the company pays the claim.

Why did the company deny the first claim but not the second? The answer lies in a provision in the Liability policy known as “the Impaired Property Exclusion.”

The standard Commercial General Liability insurance policy covers the insured’s liability for damage to tangible property and for the loss of use of undamaged tangible property. It also creates a category of property called “impaired property.” This is tangible property (other than the insured’s product or work) that is either less useful or cannot be used at all because it includes the insured’s product or work, and that work is “known or thought to be defective, deficient, inadequate or dangerous.” In both of the examples above, the buildings are impaired property. They cannot open with inoperable elevators, and the reason the elevators are inoperable is that they include the subcontractor’s components and the components are not working properly.

The impaired property exclusion states that the insurance does not apply to property damage to impaired property or property that has not suffered physical injury, if the damage arises from a defect or other problem with the insured’s product or work. There is also no coverage if the damage arises from the insured’s failure to live up to the terms of a contract. The hotel was unable to open because a defect in the contractor’s components prevented the elevators from working. Because the hotel had not suffered physical injury and the damage resulted from a defect in the contractor’s work, the insurance did not cover the contractor’s liability.

The exclusion has an important exception, however. The insurance will apply to the loss of use of other property if it arose from sudden and accidental injury to the insured’s product or work after it has been put to its intended use. The elevators in the apartment building initially worked; they didn’t break down until after the building opened. Because the damage arose out of damage to the contractor’s work after it was put to its intended use, the insurance covered the contractor’s liability.

The impaired property exclusion removes coverage when merely replacing the defective part will solve the problem, but it provides coverage when a defective part damages other property and necessitates repairs. The distinction can be subtle, but it determines whether a contractor has insurance for thousands of dollars in damages.

The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission received more than 30,000 complaints of harassment in the workplace during 2009. It found 4% of them to have merit, and the employers involved paid $80 million in penalties. That same year, it received more than 12,000 complaints of sexual harassment, 33,000 complaints of racial discrimination, and 11,000 complaints of discrimination based on national origin. The employers who were found to have permitted these actions were fined more than $150 million, and these dollar amounts do not include settlements of lawsuits between the employers and affected individuals. The lesson: Allowing a hostile work environment is bad for an employer’s bottom line. Courts have ruled that a work environment is hostile if the speech or conduct occurring there is severe or pervasive enough to offend a reasonable person. This includes things like:

• Sexually explicit remarks
• Sexually explicit displays, such as calendars, posters, and screen savers
• Frequent use of language that denigrates members of one sex, racial, or ethnic group
• Sexually or racially oriented jokes and e-mails
• Unwanted physical contact
• Unwanted solicitations

Managers can be responsible for harassing behaviors in the workplace, even if they do not participate in them. The U.S. Supreme Court has ruled that a company may be legally liable for sexual harassment by supervisors even if the employees do not report it. In a separate case, the court ruled that companies may have legal liability even where the employees do not demonstrate that they suffered a tangible loss. However, there are several things employers can do to keep their workplaces free of harassment.

• Develop and enforce a written workplace policy against all forms of discrimination and harassment. The policy should define prohibited acts, consequences for violating the policy, procedures for reporting violations, and a clear statement that there will not be retribution against those who complain. Every employee should receive a copy of it. It might be necessary to provide training on what constitutes harassment and what employees can do about it.
• Managers must themselves not act in ways that might appear to be harassment, and they must take steps to stop any harassment of which they become aware.
• Follow the established procedures for dealing with harassment. Report all complaints to the human resources manager or other responsible staff person. Conduct a prompt and thorough investigation. Take appropriate action, if called for, against the perpetrator. Depending on the severity of the offense, these actions can range from a verbal warning to a written reprimand to termination of employment.
• Update the computer usage policy to include prohibiting accessing Internet sites that are inappropriate for a work environment. The policy should also warn employees against circulating sexually explicit jokes and materials through the e-mail system. Install filtering software to block employees from visiting pornographic websites. Monitor Internet usage and report to human resources incidents of employees visiting offensive sites. Add provisions to vendor contracts requiring vendors working onsite to abide by the employer’s computer usage rules.

All businesses should consider buying Employment Practices Liability insurance (EPLI). This insurance covers amounts an employer is legally liable to pay because of employment offenses such as discrimination, harassment, discrimination in hiring, firing, or promoting, and other acts. The insurance also covers the costs of defending a claim. Even well-run workplaces might become targets of employee lawsuits, so it is important to have this protection as a backstop.

The workplace should be a safe environment where employees can perform up to their potential. With appropriate rules and attention, managers can keep their workplaces harassment free.

Two work crews building a new home are taking a break. One of the employees of the plumbing contractor and a carpenter get into a little verbal sparring. It starts out good-natured but turns heated, and the plumber picks up a metal nut and flips it in the other man’s direction. At that moment, the carpenter stands up directly in the nut’s path. It strikes him in the eye; the ensuing injury is so severe that he loses part of the sight in that eye. He sues the plumbing contractor and the employee who threw the object. Employer and employee both look for coverage and defense under the plumber’s Commercial General Liability (CGL) insurance policy. Although the policy will likely cover the employer, coverage for the employee is not certain.

A CGL policy normally does not cover a person (an “insured”) for liability for injuries or damages “expected or intended from the standpoint of the insured.” If the insurance company concludes that the plumber’s employee either expected or intended to injure the carpenter with the thrown nut, it will not cover either his liability or defense costs. As R. Steven Rawls and Rebecca C. Appelbaum explained in a recent article, when courts have interpreted this policy language, they tend to agree on the meaning of the word “intended” but differ on the meaning of “expected.” Courts in various states have approached the meaning of “expected” in different ways.

• Expected and intended mean the same thing. Some courts have ruled that the two words have the same meaning within the insurance policy’s context. If the plumber expected the carpenter to get hurt, he must have intended it, and vice versa.
• What did the insured think was more likely to occur? A Texas court ruled that a result, such as an injury, is expected if the insured considered its occurrence to be more likely to happen than not to happen. The same court said that a finding that the insured intended an injury requires more proof than does a finding that an injury was expected.
• If the insured committed a reckless act, does that automatically mean he expected an injury? Another Texas court did not believe so. It raised the possibility that someone, while aware of the risks of a particular action, might believe that the chances of something going wrong are low. An Indiana court also said that recklessness alone is not enough to prove that an insured expected an injury. However, an Illinois court said that some actions are so inherently dangerous (such as firing a gun) that the only possible conclusion is that the insured expected the injury.
• Two-part tests. Some courts have used a two-part test to determine expectation. A Michigan court used a test that asked, first, did the insured foresee the injury that occurred? If not, was the likelihood of the injury so overwhelming and obvious as to make unbelievable the insured’s claim that he didn’t foresee it? A Delaware court said that, where the insured clearly did not intend to injure the other person and where he should not necessarily have known that an injury would occur, the policy would cover him.

Construction sites are dangerous places; injuries can occur either through horseplay or in the normal course of work. Contractors cannot emphasize too strongly to their employees the necessity of common sense and care on the job site. If an employee injures someone else on the site, his financial well-being could depend on a court deciding whether he should have expected the injury. That’s a chance no one should want to take.

Although you might feel like an expert at operating the equipment you use each day at work, do you know the proper way to handle the equipment according to OSHA requirements? Do you know how to keep yourself, your coworkers and the heavy equipment you operate safe? By gaining a clear understanding of where you should and shouldn’t drive, as well as what kind of equipment modification you can and cannot make, you will go far in helping to maintain a safe environment on the jobsite.

Equipment Safety Rules

Many of the rules and regulations regarding the safe use of heavy equipment are based on common sense. Get familiar with the rules, and follow them for utmost jobsite safety.

• Do not drive construction vehicles on access roadways and grades unless the roadway is made for these types of vehicles.
• Seatbelts must be used in every vehicle that offers sit down operation.
• Do not give rides to anyone on the jobsite unless they are authorized to be on the equipment.
• Lifting and hauling equipment need to have their work capacity written clearly in a place where the operator can easily view it. Operators must never exceed the intended capacity.
• Brakes need to be in excellent condition, and must be able to actually stop the vehicle with a full load not just the empty vehicle weight.
• Machines that can travel in two directions must have alarms that are audible and functioning while the machine is moving in either direction.
• Make sure scissor points are always guarded.
• Emergency access ramps should be built so that they control and stop vehicles that move on their own, without an operator, when they are not supposed to.

Equipment Modification Rules

At times, construction equipment is modified to make operating it easier. Modifications are allowable unless:

• The modification changes the capacity of the equipment. If you wish to modify something to enable it to haul or move more weight, you must first get the manufacturer’s permission.
• The modification changes the safety of the vehicle. If you realize that a vehicle is easier to operate without the safety controls in effect, you cannot alter the vehicle to remove them. No matter how experienced you and your coworkers are, those safety devices are there for a reason, and are required at all times.
• The steering knobs do not prevent spinning due to road reaction. Steering knobs might make your job easier, but if they allow the hand wheel to spin as a reaction to the road, then they are dangerous.

Most jobsite accidents are preventable. When an accident does occur, it not only reduces productivity, but it also hurts employees and their families. By following the above guidelines for a safe jobsite, you can help ensure that fewer accidents happen and more employees remain safe and healthy.

A young couple with a growing family decided to sell their current home and build a new one. They contracted with a builder, and four months later moved into a beautiful new house. They were very happy for a while. Over time, they noticed pools of water in the basement, though the pipes overhead were dry. The basement walls began to show spots of dampness, followed by mildew growth and the accompanying odor. The remediation firm hired to examine the basement told them that it appeared their home was sitting over an underground spring. Surprised to hear this, they hired another firm to test the soil and received the same diagnosis: The home builder had erected their house over a spring. The couple’s next step was to hire a lawyer who served the builder with a lawsuit.

The builder notified its liability insurance companies of the lawsuit, assuming that it would have coverage for the claim. However, there are several factors that affect the builder’s coverage. First, the company must determine whether the problems with the home are an “occurrence.” The standard Commercial General Liability policy defines an occurrence as “an accident, including continuous or repeated exposure to substantially the same general harmful conditions.” Courts have differed over what constitutes an accident (and, therefore, an occurrence.) Some have said that damage arising out of a contractor’s faulty workmanship is not an accident, not an occurrence, and not insured. Others have found that, so long as the contractor neither expected nor intended for the damage to occur, the damage was accidental and the insurance should cover it.

Second, was the damage “property damage,” which the policy defines as “physical injury to tangible property and loss of use of tangible property that is not physically injured.” Courts have found fine distinctions among different types of construction defects in this regard as well. They have held that a defect limited only to the particular component where it appears is not property damage. However, they have also ruled that a defect in one component that spreads and damages another component is property damage to the second component. In this case, the insurance should apply to the damage to the second component.

Several coverage exclusions (policy provisions defining the types of losses the insurance does not cover) might also apply to defect claims. Even if a defect passes the occurrence and property damage tests, the policy still might not offer coverage if it resulted from faulty workmanship. The insurance does not apply to property damage to “that particular part of any property that must be restored, repaired or replaced because (the insured’s work) was incorrectly performed on it.” The nature of the problem determines exactly what “that particular part” of the property is. A court might find that, since the home builder erected a house over an underground spring, the entire house is defective. Conversely, it might find that only the foundation is defective, allowing coverage for the rest of the building. Another provision excludes coverage for property damage arising out of the contractor’s work after the work has been completed, unless the work was done by a subcontractor the contractor hired. Still another excludes coverage for property damage to impaired property arising out of a defect, deficiency, inadequacy or dangerous conditions in the contractor’s work. Taken together, these provisions severely restrict insurance coverage for a major construction error like this one.

If you’re unclear about your insurance coverage, discuss your questions with one of our professional insurance agents. Insurance companies intend the Commercial General Liability policy to be a financial backstop against unforeseen injuries and damages, not a warranty of a contractor’s work.

Construction contracts typically include insurance requirements for the subcontractor to meet. For example, the contract may require the sub to carry Commercial General Liability insurance with limits equal to or greater than a specified amount, such as $1 million per occurrence. It may also require the policy to include specific coverages, such as for liability assumed under contracts or for completed operations, and it may require the policy to name the owner and general contractor as additional insureds. These agreements are between the owner or general contractor and the subcontractor. As insurance consultant Don Malecki pointed out in a recent article, however, insurance companies are beginning to insert their own requirements into the writing of contracts by including special endorsements in their policies.

One endorsement he described affects the insured entity’s premium. The endorsement requires an insured who subcontracts work to obtain certificates of insurance from all subcontractors showing that the subs have certain coverages with at least the limits of insurance specified in the endorsement. Further, the endorsement requires that the subs’ insurance companies hold A.M. Best ratings of “A minus” or higher and be size class VII or higher; name the insured (the general contractor) as an additional insured on ISO endorsement CG 20 10 07 04 or a broader endorsement; and cover the general contractor on a primary basis. This endorsement does not affect whether the insurance company will pay for losses arising out of a subcontractor’s work for the insured. Instead, it affects the premium that the insured pays. When the company performs the premium audit after the policy term expires, the auditor examines the certificates of insurance the insured collected during the term. They compare the certificates with the insured’s records of subcontracted work. For every subcontractor from whom the insured failed to get a certificate or obtained a certificate that did not meet the endorsement’s requirements, the company charges a higher premium. Insurance companies calculate premiums for subcontracted work by applying a rate for every $1,000 of subcontract cost. This company charges one rate for subcontracts that meet the endorsement’s requirements and a much higher one for those that do not.

Another example Malecki gives is of an insurer actually requiring its insured contractor to include specific wording in its contracts. In his example, the company is demanding that the contract require the subcontractor to waive any immunity or limits it has for liability beyond Workers Compensation benefits for injuries to employees. Other companies may require special hold harmless wording, such as wording that indemnifies all of the general contractor’s owners, officers, directors, employees, and other interested parties from all liability resulting from any cause of loss. This provision may cause problems for the sub, as it may extend far beyond what the sub’s insurance company is prepared to cover. For example, by requiring indemnification for loss resulting from any cause, the wording implies that the sub will be responsible for pollution incidents. However, virtually all standard general liability policies exclude coverage for pollution.

Contractors should work closely with our insurance agents to determine exactly what requirements, if any, their insurance companies are imposing on their contracts. Some of these requirements might be steps that the contractor should contemplate taking regardless. However, contractors need to become informed about these requirements, so they can make appropriate plans and decide whether to accept coverage from a company that requires this.

Many organizations use tests to help them evaluate prospective employees or candidates for promotions. The tests help employers measure a person’s aptitude for a job or how well the person will fit within the organization. Some small businesses have job candidates take personality tests. A chain of video rental stores requires prospective employees to take a long multiple-choice exam similar in format to the Scholastic Aptitude Test.

Employers like to use these tests because they theoretically provide objective measures of a candidate, shielding the employer from accusations of illegal discrimination or favoritism and giving them a handy way to compare multiple candidates for the same job. However, the use of employee tests carries risks, though a 2009 U.S. Supreme Court decision lowered those risks for employers.

Title VII of the federal Civil Rights Act of 1964 requires employers to meet standards that, in this case, conflicted with one another. It prohibits employers from intentionally discriminating in employment decisions on the basis of race, color, religion, sex, or national origin. It refers to such discrimination as “disparate treatment.”� It also forbids some employment practices that, while appearing to be neutral, have a disproportionate effect on members of minority groups (what the law calls “disparate impact”).

The city of New Haven, Connecticut ran into this conflict when it administered tests to measure the readiness of city firefighters for promotions to officer status. Though the city took great pains to design and administer a fair test, almost twice as many whites passed as did blacks, and Hispanics fared even worse. Fearing a lawsuit based on the disparate impact of the test, the city decided to throw out all the results. This decision led a (mostly white) group of firefighters who had passed the test but not received promotions to sue the city, claiming that the city discriminated against them because of their race. The trial court and a federal appellate court sided with the city, but the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in favor of the firefighters.

The court acknowledged that an employer could be liable for the disparate impact of a promotional exam. However, this would be the case only if the exam was not related to the job and necessary for the business, or if the employer had the option of using a different, non-discriminatory exam and chose not to use it. The court further said that the city was wrong to throw out the test results merely because it did not like them. To justify throwing out the results, the city had to show that the test’s construction and content discriminated against minorities. Noting the efforts the city made to ensure a fair test, the court concluded that the exam was not disparate treatment. The decision set a standard for discrimination claims: Title VII allows corrective action for racial discrimination only when strong evidence exists that the employer would have been liable for disparate impact even if it had not taken the particular action.

The federal Equal Employment Opportunity Commission advises employers who use tests to do the following:

• Administer tests without regard to race, color, national origin, religion, sex, disability, or age.
• Ensure that the tests are validated properly for the particular positions and purposes to which they apply.
• Identify and use alternative selection procedures when a test screens out a protected employee group.
• Update tests so that they reflect changing job requirements.
• Ensure that hiring managers understand a test’s effectiveness and limitations for predicting future job performance.

Used properly, tests can be a useful tool for evaluating job candidates, but employers must recognize the pitfalls into which tests can lead them.

Construction contracts often require a subcontractor’s General Liability insurance policy to name the owner or general contractor as an additional insured on a “primary and noncontributory” basis. This seemingly simple requirement can cause a lot of difficulty and might hamper the sub’s ability to start the project. The International Risk Management Institute recommends that risk managers not include this requirement in contracts. Insurance agents can add wording to a certificate of insurance only if the insurance company approves it. Insurance companies tend to resist adding this language to their policies and certificates. Why are the words “primary and noncontributory” such a problem?

In liability insurance claims, when two policies cover the same loss, one usually applies on a primary basis and the other on an excess basis. This means that one will pay first (the primary policy), and the other will pay only if the primary policy either does not cover the loss at all or if the amount of insurance is not enough to pay for the entire loss. For example, if the primary policy has a limit of $1 million for each occurrence and the amount of the loss is $1.5 million, the primary will pay its limit of $1 million and the other policy, which applies on an excess basis, pays the remaining $500,000.

If both the general contractor and the subcontractor have bought modern editions of the Insurance Services Office’s Commercial General Liability Coverage Form, the subcontractor’s policy is primary automatically. The form’s wording makes the insured’s coverage excess over any policy that has added the insured as an additional insured by endorsement. Therefore, the “primary” part of the requirement is a minor issue.

The “noncontributory” requirement is more of a problem. Most contracts do not define the term’s meaning, and most insurance policies and endorsements do not include it at all. The GC may believe it means that its policy will not pay even on excess basis; if the sub’s limit of insurance is not large enough to cover the loss, the GC may expect the sub to pay the remainder out of pocket.

The standard additional insured endorsement to a general liability policy covers the additional insured with respect to liability for injury or damage caused at least in part by the sub’s acts or omissions. It also covers liability for acts or omissions of those working for the sub. Coverage lasts as long as the sub has ongoing operations for the additional insured. It does not say anything about the additional insured’s coverage being noncontributory. This is the problem: It is not standard insurance industry practice to cover additional insureds on a noncontributory basis. Insurance companies are reluctant to change that, as they want the additional insured’s coverage to contribute toward paying for the loss. A GC has less incentive to prevent losses when it knows that its own insurance will not be needed.

If you run into this requirement, notify one of our agents immediately and ask the insurance company to provide the coverage. If it won’t, you must notify the GC and negotiate alternative terms in order to avoid breaching the contract. The GC may agree to accept the standard endorsement with a promise not to reduce its coverage. You should also consider asking about seeking this coverage at the next policy renewal. Most importantly, understand what the contract requires and ask questions about provisions that are unclear. No one wants to find out after an insured loss that you must pay part of it out of pocket.

Jacqueline Butler did not receive a promotion from the Texas law firm where she worked, and she suspected that her race had something to do with it. In July 2001, she filed complaints with the Texas human rights commission and the federal Equal Employment Opportunity Commission. The EEOC notified the employer, who responded a month later. The following spring, the EEOC informed Butler that she had the right to sue the employer, which she promptly did. In turn, the employer made a claim with the company that provided its Employment Practices Liability insurance. Four weeks later, the insurance company denied the claim; the employer had no choice but to pay for its own legal defense and any potential settlement. In 2006, the employer sued the insurance company for the costs of its defense, but a federal court in 2007 upheld the claim denial.

Why did the employer’s insurance not pay for a discrimination claim? Because the employer took too long to submit it.

A typical policy requires the insured to give the insurer notice of any claims made against it as soon as practicable. In the Texas case, the policy went further — it required written notice to the insurer as soon as practicable and in no event later than sixty (60) days after such Claim was first made. The insurer maintained that Butler made her claim in July 2001, when she filed complaints with authorities. As evidence, it cited the policy’s definition of a claim as any judicial, administrative or other proceeding against any Insured for any Employment Practices Wrongful Act. Since the complaints filed with the authorities initiated administrative proceedings, the insurer held that they also constituted a claim. In the insurer’s opinion, the policy did not provide coverage if the employer did not give notice within 60 days of when Butler filed the complaints.

The employer argued that, since it notified the insurer within 60 days of receiving notice of the lawsuit, it had complied with the policy’s conditions. However, the court agreed with the insurer.

Insurance companies do not include this language in their policies simply to get out of having to pay claims. The sooner they know about events that might involve coverage, the better they can investigate and prepare legal defense. As time elapses, witnesses’ memories become less reliable, or witnesses might move away, and memos, e-mails, and other types of evidence might become hard to find. Also, a claimant who has been kept waiting for a length of time might become angry and unwilling to negotiate a settlement. Therefore, even without a firm 60-day deadline, an insurance company might deny coverage when the insured fails to give prompt notice of a claim.

Courts have not developed a standard for what is “prompt” notice, but they normally consider three questions: How long was the delay? What are the reasons for the delay? How does the delay affect the insurer’s ability to handle the claim? Sometimes, a court will excuse a late notice if it decides the insured had a reasonable basis for believing it was not liable for any harm. However, in a situation where an employee has filed complaints with authorities, the court might not agree that such a belief was reasonable.

The safest course for employers is to notify their insurance companies or agents as soon as they become aware of any type of employee complaints to outside authorities. Even if the employer believes the charges to be groundless, it should put the company on notice. Our professional insurance agents can advise you on what the policy requires it to do when a charge is made. The best time to have that discussion is before something happens.