When you buy car insurance from ICBC, what you are buying is coverage in case you are at fault for causing a car accident. For that peace of mind, you as an insured have an expectation of insurance coverage when you purchased that policy and you place great reliance on ICBC providing you coverage for an accident.
Generally, your insurance policy with ICBC covers things like property damage, personal injury claims, and even hiring a lawyer to defend you in a lawsuit for any claims arising from the car accident.
Still, it is important to remember that your insurance policy with ICBC is a contract, and like any other contract, it can be breached. If you breach a contract, you are breaking the contract.
If ICBC has denied you coverage for any reason, give us a call at 604-370-3051. For personal injury cases, you don’t pay unless you win.
A breach of your ICBC policy means that if you are at fault for the accident, ICBC will not cover you for any claims you have made and any claims or lawsuits made against you, including providing a lawyer for you if you are sued for the crash. ICBC will also seek to recover from you any payouts made as a result from the accident, including any injury and property claims paid to the other parties from the accident.
According to your ICBC insurance contract, ICBC can find you in breach of your insurance contract for a whole host of reasons. Some of the typical alleged breaches include:
Hit and run
Not reporting an accident to ICBC
Failing to cooperate with ICBC in their investigation
Making a false statement to ICBC
Driving without a valid driver’s license
Driving While Prohibited
Using your car contrary to your insurance policy
Using your car for illegal purposes
Evading the police
Racing
Driving under the influence of alcohol or drugs
Failing to remain at an accident
Fraud
Fortunately, just because the adjuster at ICBC alleges that you breached your policy, it does not necessarily end the matter. ICBC has an internal dispute process. Even if the ICBC contract breach is upheld through ICBC’s internal review, this is still not the final word. You can still sue ICBC for coverage. The courts have the last word since an ICBC contract breach is a matter of law and not a matter of opinion.
If you get the sense that ICBC might find you in breach, it is imperative to contact a lawyer immediately, not only because there are strict time limits involved in disputing an ICBC contract breach, but also because this is when your rights are most critically affected, with life altering consequences, that may leave you potentially liable for tens of thousands of dollars, if not hundreds of thousands of dollars.
We deal with a lot of driving cases, particularly when the police are involved. We found that lawyers generally are not enthusiastic about dealing with ICBC contract breach cases because rather than obtaining a big cash settlement, the goal is to mitigate and if possible eliminate the damages in a potential breach situation. We handle ICBC contract breach cases because we like to help people and we want to make sure that the Government insurance company is held to their obligations.
If you think ICBC might be investigating your claim to allege an ICBC contract breach, call us and we will explain what we need to do to protect your rights under the contract.
