Month: May 2014

The Setanta car crash: what about injured parties?

The collapse of Setanta Insurance is not just a shambles for policyholders. They, at least, could arrange new insurance and at worst lost only the unexpired value of their policy. But what about someone injured in a road traffic accident cause by a Setanta policyholder?

The situation remains murky. Information available from the Central Bank and other sources initially referred to the Irish Insurance Compensation Fund. Calling on the ICF for all claims involving Setanta would put further pressure on the Fund but also be significantly unfair to injured parties, as it only pays out 65% of a claim or €825,000 (whichever is lower). For example: a claimant for €1.5 million would only get €825,000 from the ICF; a claimant for €100,000 would only get €65,000.

In the aftermath of the news solicitors obviously reviewed their personal injury files for claims against Setanta and, in the case of such claims, look for another source of cover. The prospect of involving the Motor Insurers’ Bureau of Ireland immediately arose. The gut response is that MIBI was set up to cover claims against uninsured or untraced drivers, whereas the ICF was set up to cover insolvent insurers. Surely a claim against Setanta “belongs” with the ICF?

The MIBI agreement is poorly worded at the best of times but in this situation perhaps for the better. The agreement says that if an award which should be covered by an approved policy of insurance is not paid in full within 28 days then, whether or not insurance actually was in place, MIBI will pay it. This interpretation is supported by guidance from Insurance Ireland, the industry body, which says that awards not honoured by Setanta should be referred to MIBI who would pay out and seek to recoup funds in Malta, where Setanta is regulated.

On 1 May 2014, the Minister for Finance stated in the Dáil that

The Motor Insurance Bureau of Ireland [sic] (“MIBI”) have indicated that they intend to accept all third party claims in connection to Setanta policies.

The minister responsible for the agreement with MIBI is the Minister for Transport. The Department of Transport has not had much to say about Setanta to date but the Minister for Transport was asked in the Dáil on 8 May 2014 how MIBI would handle Setanta claims. He responded:

The arrangement MIBI puts in place for dealing with the Setanta claims is a matter for the MIBI itself under the terms of the Agreement. I will arrange for the Deputy’s question to be forwarded to the MIBI for them to respond directly to her.

This does not go so far as confirming that MIBI will, in fact, be covering Setanta claims. The question asked of him is important because when a claim arises from an uninsured driver MIBI is sued alongside the defendant (or as the sole defendant if the driver is untraced), whereas the obligation to pay out on foot of an award which has not been honoured by an insurance company is different. There are likely to be a number of cases where a claimant has already sued the other driver but might now be statute barred as against MIBI, if required to join them. However, in that situation one would assume that MIBI should not necessarily be sued as a co-defendant. But the Law Society advises that claims against Setanta be notified to MIBI in the same manner as uninsured/untraced driver cases. This would involve MIBI being sued alongside the driver.

The Irish Brokers Association got a legal opinion on the situation but really it goes no further than to summarise the ICF and MIBI regimes and state that “recent Dáil comments indicate the MIBI scheme may be available in the context of Setanta.”

What has been the response of MIBI to such notifications? I received my first this morning.

Paul Merceica has recently been appointed as liquidator of [Setanta Insurance] and will be responsible for the administration of the Company’s assets and liabilities … You may also wish to refer to the website of the Malta Financial Services Authority for further information …

This is an update about the liquidation of Setanta Insurance, not about how MIBI will deal with Setanta claims made against it. [As an aside: good luck trying to get a substantive response from the Setanta contact centre.] The only relevant response was as follows:

At this point we cannot confirm our position.

Accordingly, how can it be said with certainty that MIBI will voluntarily meet Setanta third party claims? And who is in charge?

In relation to the wider problem with Setanta, David Murphy has a great post on the RTÉ Business blog which highlights a significant fact:

The Central Bank became aware that there were problems in Setanta late last year, it was still permitted to sell insurance policies until it the end of 2013 and went bust last month.

While a customer of Setanta with the foresight to see the writing on the wall had the option of switching cover before the appointment of a liquidator and getting a refund of part of their policy, someone with a claim against Setanta had whether or not they got their money out largely depend on lucky timing.

Service of court documents by social media in Ireland

In recent years there has been a steady flow of stories about the service of court proceedings using Facebook or Twitter, for example. The media likes the novelty of these stories but there is no new law involved.

Certain court documents, particularly those which initiate a case or give notice of a hearing, must be served on the other party. The importance of service is not necessarily that the recipient is aware of the full contents of the documents served or every detail of the case. Rather:

the fundamental purpose of service [is] to give the defendant notice and sufficient warning of the proceedings that he might have to contest. (Dixon J, Royal Bank of Ireland Limited v. Nolan)

Here are some examples of service by social media:

  • In 2009 the UK High Court allowed service of an injunction by direct message on Twitter where the message included a link to the full text of the injunction.
  • In 2011 a UK county court allowed service of a court document by Facebook.
  • Australian courts have allowed service by Facebook and LinkedIn.
  • In 2012 a South African court allowed service of a notice to set down a trial by Facebook message, in addition to being published in a newspaper.
  • In 2012 the UK High Court allowed the service of a commercial claim by Facebook (AKO Capital LLP & another v TFS Derivatives & others [2012]).

AKO Capital is a good example because some detail is available from a note on the case by Latham & Watkins. This was a claim against a financial services broker for alleged overcharging and the broker wished to join a former employee as a co-defendant. Before granting permission for service by Facebook the Court sought assurances that the account belonged to the recipient and that he habitually checked the account. For example, evidence was given that he had recently accepted friend requests. The Court ordered that the relevant documents could be sent as pdf attachments to a private message and service was deemed to have occurred 14 days after the message was sent.

On the home front, Mr Justice Peart granted an order for service by private message on Facebook in 2012 where the plaintiff was not able to locate an address, contact number or other means of contact for the defendant apart from his Facebook account.

You’re not doing anything until the solicitor gets here.

This topic surfaces in discussions of “social media law” and similar areas of law, which brings to mind Frank Easterbrook’s “law of the horse” analogy from the mid-90s.

Lots of cases deal with sales of horses; others deal with people kicked by horses; still more deal with the licensing and racing of horses, or with the care veterinarians give to horses, or with prizes at horse shows. Any effort to collect these strands into a course on “The Law of the Horse” is doomed to be shallow and to miss unifying principles. Teaching 100 percent of the cases on people kicked by horses will not convey the law of torts very well. (Easterbrook FH, ‘Cyberspace and the law of the horse’ 1996 U Chi Legal F 207)

Service by social media is just another form of substituted service. Most court rules internationally require that court documentation is served in a particular form, such as by personal delivery or registered post, but also provide that alternatives can be used with the permission of the court. Irish court rules provide for such “substituted service” and nothing in those long-standing rules limits the potential for service by social media.

There are separate but similar rules for each of the Irish courts (District, Circuit, High & Supreme) which provide that an application can be made to the relevant Court for service in an alternative manner where there is a reason why the usual manner cannot be used.

Like many areas of the law, new scenarios can work with old laws and no update is required. However, as can be seen from the evidence presented by the applicant in AKO Capital, the affidavit which grounds the application for substituted service should include more detail than would ordinarily be the case in a standard application. At the very least the Court should be provided with:

  • details of the difficulties in affecting service in the ordinary way and what efforts have been made to do it;
  • evidence to establish that the target social media account is owned by the person upon whom service is to be effected;
  • evidence to establish that the social media account is active within a reasonable period of the application; and
  • details of any relevant technical issues and how they will be addressed (for example, if service was by Twitter direct message, how documents will be accessed by the recipient).

Recent experience in the US suggests that some jurisdictions might not allow service by Facebook alone, for example. The rules in the US states are different from those in Ireland and certainly there is no reason why service in Ireland cannot be effected by Facebook alone, subject to the Court being satisfied on the criteria listed above. If there was a concern about the effectiveness of service, an Irish court could direct some other additional mode of service, as happened in the South African case mentioned above.

The issue of service frequently arises as a potential technicality to defeat proceedings but the Courts can retrospectively deem service to be effective, as can be seen from this reason Supreme Court decision.