Opinion ID: 878792
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 6

Heading: issues

Text: Guiberson's personal insurer, Hartford, provides in its policy: If there is other applicable similar insurance we will pay only our share. Our share is the proportion that our limit of liability bears to the total of all applicable limits. However, any insurance we provide with respect to a vehicle you do not own shall be excess over any other collectible insurance.  (Emphasis added.) State Farm's policy on the beer truck states: If the insured is injured while occupying your car, and your car is described on the declaration page of another policy providing uninsured motorist vehicle coverage, we are liable only for our share. Our share is that percent of the damages that the limit of liability of this coverage bears to the total of all such uninsured motor vehicle coverage applicable to the accident. Hartford contends that the specific language of the uninsured motorist provisions in both policies when construed together denotes State Farm as the primary insurer and Hartford as the excess insurer under this factual situation. Hartford relies on Montana case law to illustrate that the clauses are not repugnant and that Hartford's liability does not arise until the limits of the collectible coverage under State Farm have been exceeded. Mountain States Mutual Casualty Co. v. American Casualty Co. (1959), 135 Mont. 475, 342 P.2d 748. State Farm argues that our court should adopt a rule that the company which provides the personal policy to the named insurer is the primary insurer, per a classification scheme found at 12A, Couch on Insurance 23 § 45:635, and other insurance be regarded as excess. We find Hartford's argument more persuasive. It allows us to look at the policies as actually drafted by the insurers to determine the coverage agreed upon between insurer and insured. Hartford's policy clearly states that any insurance it provides to its named insured on any vehicle he does not own shall be excess over any other collectible insurance. State Farm's policy has no provision covering excess insurance, and cannot claim by its policy to be an excess insurer. As drafted, State Farm's policy claims liability only for its share if the insured is injured while occupying your car, and you car is described on the declaration page of another policy providing uninsured motorist vehicle coverage... . This language activates a pro rata apportionment when the insured vehicle involved in the accident is described in another policy which provides uninsured motorist liability coverage, i.e., when there is more than one policy particularly describing and covering the vehicle. Because Hartford's policy does not describe or cover the beer truck, it does not activate the shared liability provided for in State Farm's policy. Furthermore, Hartford's policy provides that it will pay its share if there is any other applicable similar insurance, i.e., when the named insured (here Guiberson) has other similar liability coverage on automobiles he owns. But vehicles not owned by the named insured come under the excess coverage provision. We reverse the District Court on the apportionment of the $300,000 liability of Tintinger, the uninsured motorist, between Hartford and State Farm. We hold that Hartford was an excess insurer on vehicles not owned by the policyholder and that neither policy's language provided apportionment of liability under this factual situation, where the beer truck was not described in another policy and not owned by the plaintiff. Issue Number 4: Stacking of coverage limits when separate premiums are paid for by the insured. Because we hold that Hartford is an excess insurer on vehicles not owned by its insured, we must determine what, if any, excess Hartford owes. The trial court stacked the $25,000 uninsured motorist liability limit (the same coverage the insured is entitled to) of each vehicle to arrive at State Farm's upper limit of $350,000 liability on behalf of the employer for the entire fleet of fourteen beer trucks. The court also stacked the coverage Guiberson purchased from Hartford on his two vehicles at $50,000 each to arrive at an upper limit of $100,000 under Hartford's policy. We will not overturn the District Court's stacking in this case. At the time of the accident, the practice was recognized of adding coverage based upon the payment of separate premiums on separate vehicles. See, Chaffee v. U.S. Fid. & Guar. Co. (1979), 181 Mont. 1, 591 P.2d 1102; Kemp v. Allstate (1979), 183 Mont. 526, 601 P.2d 20. We held that this liability coverage the insured had purchased extended to the uninsured motorist. In applying Montana law, we determine that the uninsured motorist coverages are to be `stacked'; that is, in policies of insurance which cover two or more vehicles, if a separate premium has been charged and collected on each vehicle for uninsured vehicle coverage, the insured is entitled to recover under uninsured motorist coverage sums found legally recoverable up to the aggregate sum of the coverages on all the motor vehicles so insured. Kemp v. Allstate, 601 P.2d at 24. The accident occurred in January, 1981. The Montana Legislature passed a law abolishing stacking, § 33-23-203, MCA, which became effective on October 1, 1981. The lower court properly applied the law in effect at the time of the accident. Although the law forbids stacking now, we will not apply the law retroactively to deprive the plaintiff of coverage he was entitled to at the time of his accident. He was entitled to $350,000 coverage from the fourteen separate premiums his employer purchased from State Farm, plus $100,000 coverage from Hartford as the excess insurer. Because the liability of the uninsured motorist, Tintinger, was determined to be $300,000, State Farm as the primary insurer adequately covers the judgment and Hartford owes nothing as the excess insurer.