Insurance/Reinsurance

Clients and work in this area include:

• Acted for a Lloyd's Syndicate in managing down its exposure on a US$1 billion book of insurance business protecting a large number of US based assureds on quasi-financial guarantee policies. The matter involved managing litigation and arbitration in the UK, USA and Ireland.
  
• Acted for a Lloyd's Syndicate in successfully participating in arbitration proceedings where they had been fraudulently induced into underwriting insurance policies. The Syndicate has recovered significant damages.
  
• Act for Cavell USA Inc. and their Chairman, Mr Kenneth Randall, in obtaining a decision in the English Court that New York proceedings brought against them by two US insurers, Seaton and Stonewall, were issued in breach of a settlement agreement giving the English Court exclusive jurisdiction over disputes.
  
• Advising Chartis Insurance UK Limited  on various reinsurance matters, including follow the settlement issues arising out of a claim under a construction all risks policy for a defective nitrogen air supply plant in Mexico. This case involved a large team of lawyers who undertook an analysis of the defect/damage law in Mexico, California and England, worked with experts in multiple disciplines, and reviewed in excess of two million pages of underlying documents.
  
• Act for a number of reinsurers of financial institution’s insurance and reinsurance. We have provided advice on very substantial claims arising from the failures of well known financial institutions.
  
• Advised Tesco on difficult issues concerning the construction of their new Gerrards Cross site. After the partial collapse of a tunnel,Tesco faced a very substantial claim for economic loss by the train operator,Chiltern Railway Company Limited.  The public liability policy taken out by Tesco was subject to scrutiny in the Commercial Court and the Court of Appeal. The case was decided in favour of the insurers and Tesco had to meet Chiltern's claim. Complex issues regarding the reinstatement of the damaged Works and increased costs of construction also had to be considered as well as claims against the original construction team.
  
• Acted in numerous cases arising out of claims from the terrorist attacks on 9/11, including aviation reinsurance disputes in London and overseas; these have involved numerous issues of contract interpretation and aggregation.
  
• Act for a number of the major run-off organisations on a range of issues including reinsurance recoveries and commutations.