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Concludes that Health Insurer Does Not Have to Physically Attach the Application to the Policy to Rely on Misrepresentations in Application to Support Rescission

by John M. LeBlanc and Jason C. Love

In Nieto v. Blue Shield of California Life & Health Insurance Company, ___ Cal.Rptr.3d. ___, 2010 WL 162027 (2010), the Court of Appeal considered whether Blue Shield Life – an California insurance company subject to the California Insurance Code – could rescind plaintiff Julie Nieto’s (“Nieto”) individual health insurance policy based on misrepresentations concerning her medical history contained in the application she submitted to Blue Shield Life.

The Court of Appeal affirmed the trial court’s grant of summary judgment in Blue Shield Life’s favor, concluding that Blue Shield Life had no statutory duty to physically attach Nieto’s application to the insurance policy, nor to conduct further inquiries beyond the application during the underwriting process to ascertain the truthfulness of Nieto’s representations in the application before it issued the policy.

In reaching this conclusion, the Court discussed its holding in light of the recent decisions in Ticconi v. Blue Shield of California Life & Health Ins. Co., 160 Cal.App.4th 528 (2008) and Hailey v. California Physicians' Service, 158 Cal.App.4th 452 (2007).

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Since January 1, 2006, Part D of the Medicare Act has provided Medicare beneficiaries with an elective prescription drug benefit option. Under Part D, benefits are administered to beneficiaries through private health insurance companies, known as “sponsors,” which contract with the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS).

In late 2005, Do Sung Uhm and Eun Sook Uhm (the “Uhms”), Medicare beneficiaries, applied for the prescription drug benefit plan offered by Humana (the “Plan”). In accordance with the Uhms’ election to receive benefits under Part D, the Social Security Administration withheld monthly premiums from their social security benefits.

Pursuant to the Plan, the Uhms’ benefits were to begin on January 1, 2006; however, as of February 6, 2006, the Uhms had not received any information from Humana regarding how to obtain their benefits. As a result, the Uhms had to pay out-of-pocket for their prescription medications.

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In a decision published October 26, 2009, a unanimous panel of the Fourth Appellate District, Division Three, affirmed the trial court’s order denying class certification in a case handled by Barger & Wolen, Kaldenbach v. Mutual of Omaha et. al. Among other things, the court of appeal held that the California Supreme Court's recent decision in In re Tobacco II Cases, 46 Cal.4th 298 (2009) (“Tobacco II”) did not mandate reversal of the trial court's decision.

Kaldenbach's case arose from his purchase of an alleged “vanishing premium” life insurance policy. He claimed that, when he purchased an “Advantage Life” universal life insurance policy from Defendant Mutual of Omaha Life Insurance Company (“Mutual”), his agent represented that he would have to pay only four annual premiums, after which he would never have to pay another premium. Kaldenbach alleged those oral representations were false, as he later was required to pay more than four premiums to keep his policy in force. Seeking to transform his individual dispute into a class action, Kaldenbach also alleged that Mutual committed “class-wide” misrepresentations and omissions in scripted presentations and standardized marketing and training materials which, among other things, supposedly violated California’s Unfair Competition Law, Business and Professions Code section 17200 et seq. (“UCL”).

In opposing class certification, Mutual showed that the class allegations involved thousands of individualized point-of-sale transactions between a policy owner and an agent — a scenario that courts consistently hold is not subject to class treatment. Mutual’s evidence demonstrated that Kaldenbach’s case, like those of the other putative class members, was based upon the unique dialogue between an agent and a policy owner, and that marketing materials, agent training and sales illustrations were not uniform. The trial court denied class certification, holding that Kaldenbach failed to meet any of the criteria required for class certification. Kaldenbach thereafter filed an appeal.

Prior to the hearing on Kaldenbach’s motion for class certification, Californians passed Proposition 64 (“Prop 64”), which limited standing under the UCL to a “person who has suffered injury in fact and has lost money or property as a result of [such] unfair competition.” See Business and Professions Code § 17204. Additionally, Prop 64 mandated that UCL representative actions satisfy class action requirements under California Code of Civil Procedure section 382. At the time the trial court decided Kaldenbach’s class certification motion, Tobacco II — which raised the issue of whether, after Prop 64, each class member was now required to show an injury in fact, consisting of lost money or property, as a result of the alleged unfair competition — was pending before the California Supreme Court.

After Kaldenbach and Mutual completed their briefing and oral argument on appeal, the Supreme Court issued its opinion in Tobacco II, holding that, to demonstrate standing to pursue a UCL claim as a class action, only the named plaintiff must show an injury in fact, consisting of lost money or property, as a result of the alleged unfair competition. Tobacco II, supra at 305-306, 324. The Supreme Court explained that the “standing requirements are applicable only to the class representatives, and not all absent class members.” Id. at 306. Significantly, the Supreme Court also concluded that “Proposition 64 was not intended to, and does not, impose section 17204’s standing requirements on absent class members in a UCL class action where class requirements have otherwise been found to exist.” ld. at 324.

In light of Tobacco II, the court of appeal in Kaldenbach requested further briefing on UCL class action issues. In one of the first appellate decisions to interpret Tobacco II, the court of appeal affirmed the trial court’s decision, rejecting Kaldenbach’s argument that class certification was appropriate because reliance need not be proven on a class-wide basis under the UCL. The court of appeal reasoned that reliance was only one of the individualized issues noted by the trial court. Moreover, unlike Tobacco II, which involved identical misrepresentations and/or nondisclosures made to the entire class, in Kaldenbach’s case, no evidence linked alleged sales materials, training or illustrations to what was actually said or demonstrated in any sales presentation. Accordingly, the appellate court held that individualized issues predominated as to whether Mutual in fact committed an unfair business practice that was “likely to mislead” the putative class. 

Ed Oster, Sandra Weishart and Misty Murray of Barger & Wolen are counsel for Mutual.
 

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Ashcroft v. Iqbal, 556 U.S. ___, 129 S.Ct. 1937 (2009), the 5-month-old U.S. Supreme Court decision that has made federal pleadings standards much more stringent, will get a Capitol Hill airing on Tuesday October 27, 2009. The House Judiciary Committee is scheduled to hold the first congressional hearing on the far-reaching May ruling, which raised the pleading standard for most civil complaints, making it more difficult to keep cases from being dismissed.

Iqbal was a 5 to 4 decision delivered on May 18, 2009 by Justice Kennedy held that Iqbal’s complaint failed to plead sufficient facts to state a claim for purposeful and unlawful discrimination.

Under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 8(a)(2), a complaint must contain a “short and plain statement of the claim showing that the pleader is entitled to relief.” “[D]etailed factual allegations” are not required (Bell Atlantic Corp. v. Twombly, 550 U.S. 544, 555 (2007)), but the Rule does call for sufficient factual matter, accepted as true, to “state a claim to relief that is plausible on its face,” Id. at 570. A claim has facial plausibility when the pleaded factual content allows the court to draw the reasonable inference that the defendant is liable for the misconduct alleged. Id. at 556.

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The practice of paying different rates based on gender for the same insurance is called gender rating.  Effective January 1, 2010, health insurance companies and HMO's writing insurance in California will not be able to charge men and women different rates for the same type of insurance policy.  It has been reported that currently, California women pay anywhere from 5% to 30% more than male counterparts for equivalent insurance, even on policies without maternity coverage.   

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As reported by the Associated Press today, a House committee has voted to strip the health insurance industry of its exemption from federal antitrust laws as senators announced plans to take the same step.  The House Judiciary Committee voted 20 to 9 to repeal a law that exempted the health insurance industry from federal controls over certain antitrust violations, including price-fixing.

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On Monday October 19, 2009, Lisa Girion of the Los Angeles Times reported on the healthcare reform bills being debated in Congress and their potential impact on claim denials by insurers. Girion states that, “Despite growing frustration with the way health insurers deny medical treatments, major healthcare bills pending in Congress would give patients little new power to challenge those sometimes life-and-death decisions.” She further explains that “a patient's ability to fight insurers' coverage decisions could be more important than ever because Congress, in promoting cost containment and price competition, may actually add to the pressure on insurers to deny requests for treatment.”

The article discusses the wrongful death lawsuit filed by Hilda and Grigor Sarkisyan, whose daughter Nataline died in 2007 after Cigna decided not to cover a liver transplant. The lawsuit against Cigna over the transplant denial was dismissed this year by a federal judge, who ruled that the Employee Retirement Income Security Act (“ERISA”) preempts suits with state law claims for damages over such health benefit decisions. The Sarkisyans traveled to Washington this year to try to persuade members of Congress to pass legislation which would remove ERISA’s bar of certain types of damages that are now available under state law.

Rep. Adam B. Schiff (D-Burbank), who met with the Sarkisyans in Washington, said that there are not enough votes in Congress to pass such legislation.  Insurers and employers strongly support ERISA’s limitations on damages. They say any increase in litigation would drive up costs and could force some employers to drop health benefits.

The healthcare reform bill pending in the House would extend the right to sue under state law for damages to anyone who buys coverage through one of the health insurance exchanges it envisions. That could include small businesses. However, the pending legislation does not remove ERISA’s barrier to such suits by employees who procure coverage in the employment-based insurance market.

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More than a year after vetoing Senate Bill 1543 and vowing to work to pass similar legislation “quickly,” California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger signed Senate Bill 98 into law on October 11, 2009. As the rejected Senate Bill 1543 sought to do, the new law defines Stranger-Originated Life Insurance (“STOLI”) transactions as “an act, practice, or arrangement to initiate the issuance of a life insurance policy in this state for the benefit of a third-party investor who, at the time of policy origination, has no insurable interest, under the laws of this state, in the life of the insured.” The new law proscribes STOLI transactions as fraudulent, and allows the Department of Insurance to collect information from life settlement providers that will help it to monitor the market and to identify STOLI transactions. It also restricts most transactions within the first two years of a policy.

Finally, the new law adds a component the absence of which reportedly led to the rejection of Senate Bill 1543: It mandates specific disclosures to consumers, including alternatives to life settlements, and requires the licensing of professionals who transact life settlement contracts.

The law – California’s first STOLI legislation – makes California one of 26 states to enact laws regulating STOLI. Similar legislation is pending in 13 other states.

See also STOLI news post

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Allison Bell of the National Underwriter reported on September 11, 2009 that approved disability claims rose more quickly in 2008 at the Social Security Disability Insurance program than at private disability insurers. She explained that the Council for Disability Awareness in Portland, Maine reported that findings in a summary of results from an analysis of SSDI program data and a survey of the 15 CDA member disability insurance companies were as follows:

SSDI applications rose 5.9% in 2008, to 2.3 million, and the number of workers approved for SSDI benefits increased 8.7%, to 895,000, the CDA reports.

The percentage of workers covered by the SSDI program who are receiving SSDI benefits increased to 4.8% in 2008, from 3.5% in 1998.

At CDA member companies, the number of individuals receiving long-term disability benefits payments increased 1.5% in 2008, to 573,500, and 30% of the member companies’ LTD claimants do not qualify for SSDI benefits, the CDA says.

Because of the aging of the U.S. workforce, the percentage of claims filed by workers under age 50 has been declining, and the number filed by workers over that age has been increasing.

But 27% of the survey participants said the overall claims rate has stayed about the same, and 64% said the incidence rate has been falling.

Only one of the participating companies said the recession has had any noticeable effect on disability claims.
 

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