THE ACCIDENT INSURANCE CASE.

Otago Daily Times, Issue 10617, 12 March 1896, Page 3

THE ACCIDENT INSURANCE CASE.

At the sitting of the Magistrate's Court yesterday morning Mr E. H. Carew, S.M., delivered judgment in the cate Edwin Alfred Tapper (Mr Solomon) v. the New Zealand Accident Insurance Company (Mr Sim) a claim of .£96. The judgment wa3 as follows:—" The question is: 'What is the contract under the policy which applies< to this case? The policy provides three claascs of benefits. The first two do not apply to the case, the other provides for a weekly.coDipensation of, £H during the temporary total disablement—that is, in the words of' the policy, ' if the insured shall suitain any personal injury, Dot fatal, caused directly and solely by accidental external violence, within the meaning of this policy and subject to the ssyeral conditions thereof, and shall in consequence thereof be totally disabled from attending to business according to the conditions hereto.' The conditions endorsed upon tlie policy arc thus distinctly incorporated-with tlie contract. The principal one that bears ou this case is Nq. 5, and reads : 'Temporary total disablement shall mean when the insured is strictly confined to his or her residence (unless by order of medical adviser) being entirely disabled by external accidental injury received from following any portion whatever of his or her usual occupation.' Thi3 condition might be bettor expressed, but as it reads there can be no miijtike as to its meaning. The first portion is probably in ths interests of the company to make it part pf the necessary proof of the insured person's incapacity to follow any portion of his usual occupation that he was strictly confined to bis residence, while an exception is made from the provision in cases where tlie medical adviser orders otherwise. The plaintiffs evidence is that his medical adviser ordered him to leave London and to keep as much as he could in the open air. That brings plaintiff's case within the exception. With regard to the condition as a whole, the sense of it is that there is no total disablement when the insured is capable of following some portion of Mb usual occupation, and, as Mr Sim suggests, the condition was probably framed with a view of meeting the decision in Hooper v. the Accidental Death Insurance Company. Mr Tapper's' occupation for some time before the accident' was that of looking for and arranging agencies to work off commission. Ho had secured some, negotiations were pending , as. to others, and he proposed seeking for more. The accident happened on August 2, and on the 3rd Mr Tapper was ordered by his medical adviser to leave London, to keep as much as he could in the open air, and away from crowds. Mr Tapper left London, was away for 10 days, returned ag.iin, then went on a journey to Paris and back, which occupied six days, and he left London to returp to this cojony on August 23. . He says he gave up his