INSURANCE TEST CASE.

Otago Witness, Issue 3829, 2 August 1927, Page 10

INSURANCE TEST CASE.

AN UNSUCCESSFUL CLAIM. CHRISTCHURCH. July 25. Reserved judgment was given in the Supreme Court to-day by Mr Justice Adams in the test case in which Messrs Lane, Walker, and Rudkin, Ltd., hoisery manufacturers, claimed from the Yorkshire Insurance Company, Ltd., the sum of £69 3s Id as the balance of a refund due and payable to the plaintiff by the defendant in respect of policies taken out with the defendant company and cancelled afterwards pursuant to a clause in the policies. The defendant denied that there was any balance of refund due to the plaintiff. The clause concerning the cancellation stated : “The insurance may be terminated .... in which case the company will return the customary shortperiod rate for the time the policy has been in force.”

His Honor said that when the insurance was effected certain short-period rates had been fixed. The rates had been altered on December 1, 1926. and the plaintiff cancelled the policies on December 17, 1926. The answer to the question placed before the court depended upon what was meant by “customary shortperiod rate.’’ His Honor thought that the rate that was adopted by the association find was in force at the time when the policy was terminated was meant. There was no right to have the rates retained unaltered. If the rates were altered, then the altered rates became the rates for the policy and the plaintiff was not entitled to recover any sum from the defendant company.