Delays in Payment of Claims

In general, insurance companies are supposed to investigate and pay claims within a reasonable time.  If they are delaying the payment of your claim, that can negatively affect your life and potentially cause you to incur further damage.  In fact, in some instances, an insurance company’s delinquent payment of a claim has been found to be tantamount to an outright denial of the claim.

For first-party property insurance claims, an insurance company has 90 days to pay or deny a claim, unless the delay is caused by “factors beyond the control of the insurer.”  See Florida Statute Section 726.70131.  Failure to pay the claim within this time period results in the insurer owing you interest on the claim.

This law makes sense.  For every claim dollar that the insurance companies are holding onto longer than they should, they are racking up interest.  In other words, they are collecting interest that the Florida policyholders should be collecting.  While the interest they collect by holding your claim may not be substantial, if they continue this practice to thousands of policyholders for a number of years, you can see where the numbers really start adding up.  This tactic is illegal. We force insurance companies to live up to their obligations under the policy and under Florida law.