Appraisal by a third expert
The appointment of a third technician when the insurer's and the claimant's experts cannot agree on a question of fact; questions of law stay outside its scope.
Where the insurer's adjuster and the claimant's expert hold their positions, most property policies provide for a third expert. That expert is chosen by agreement or, failing that, by the president of the court where the loss occurred. The fees are split in half, which gives both sides a symmetrical reason to avoid the procedure. Its domain is narrow and often misunderstood. Third expert appraisal settles questions of fact: the cause of damage, the extent of the defects, the cost of works. It has no competence to say whether cover is owed, a question of law that stays with the court. Depending on how the clause is drafted, the opinion binds the parties or counts only as evidence, a decisive distinction few policyholders check before agreeing to it. It breaks technical deadlock. Without it, the only way out would be a long and costly court-ordered expertise, out of proportion to the sums at stake in most files.
The fire at the Lubrizol plant in Rouen on September 26, 2019, in which some 9,500 tons of chemical products burned, triggered thousands of farming and business claims across several departments. In a file of that nature, causation between the plume and the alleged loss is argued farm by farm. Third expert appraisal then stops being an exceptional route and becomes the ordinary way out of disagreement.
Follow the research
One letter a week. First, the week's underwriting note, when one is published: a dated, argued decision, signed by Paul Bernardski. Then what the observatory published on cyber risk, political risk and insurance. No account, no tracking.
No spam, one-click unsubscribe, no data ever sold.