Opinion ID: 2584004
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 6

Heading: Use of the Vehicle

Text: As a threshold matter to recovery under either the uninsured motorist (UM) or personal injury protection (PIP) provisions of a policy, the claimant must show that at the time of the accident, [1] the vehicle was being used in a manner contemplated by the policy in question. Mason v. Celina Mut. Ins. Co., 161 Colo. 442, 444, 423 P.2d 24, 25 (Colo.1967) (quoting 7 Appleman, Insurance Law and Practice § 4317). [2] While the parties to an insurance contract may certainly contract for coverage beyond that required by law, Kastner and State Farm did not do so, and Kastner's policy does not define or expand upon use. Accordingly, we apply the basic rules of insurance contract interpretation. See 7 Russ & Segalla, Couch on Insurance § 109:17 ([I]t is to be presumed that the parties contracted with the intention of executing a policy satisfying the statutory requirements, and intended to make the contract to carry out its purpose.). Because we construe ambiguities in the insurance contract against the drafter, we will generally find coverage if the use in question is one that the insured claims to have contemplated or intended at the time of contracting for insurance. McMillan, 925 P.2d at 793; see also 8 Russ & Segalla, Couch on Insurance § 119:37 (explaining that a covered use extends to any activity in utilizing the insured vehicle in the manner intended or contemplated by the insured). Where the intent of the insured is not clear, McMichael instructs us to determine the covered use by looking at all the factual circumstances, including the particular characteristics of the vehicle and the intention of [both] parties to the insurance contract. McMichael, 906 P.2d at 102. In all cases, however, the use in question must inhere in the nature of the insured automobile. Our decision in McMichael clarified that use is a separate threshold inquiry. In McMichael, we explained that [t]he first issue we must determine is whether [the claimant] was using an insured vehicle in a manner not foreign to its inherent purpose at the time of the accident. Id. at 101; see also 8 Russ & Segalla, Couch on Insurance § 119:37 ([T]he concepts of use and legal cause should be analyzed separately, avoiding the traditional proximate cause concepts.). Whatever the use, it must be one that was contemplated by the parties to the insurance contract, and must be inherent in the nature of the automobile [ ] as such. Mason, 161 Colo. at 444, 423 P.2d at 25 (internal citation omitted). While in general, operation of a motor vehicle for transportation purposes would constitute use, our cases demonstrate that use may have a broader meaning. McMichael, 906 P.2d at 102. In McMichael, we stated that to determine use, a court must look to the factual circumstances in each case. Id. Yet, even before McMichael, we clarified that use of a motor vehicle will include only those uses that are conceivable at the time of contracting for insurance and not foreign to [the vehicle's] inherent purpose. Kohl, 731 P.2d at 136 n. 2. Some vehicles may have an inherent non-transportation purpose that is plain and obvious to all contracting parties given the nature of the vehicle in question. Thus, McMichael directs us to look for factors that adequately establish whether the use in question was conceivable and foreseeable at the time the parties entered the insurance contract. McMichael, 906 P.2d at 103. Our cases applying the term use before McMichael suggested that, unless the insurance contract provides otherwise, the only conceivable use not foreign to [the] inherent purpose of a non-commercial passenger vehicle is use as a means of transportation. In Hall, we found use of the vehicle as a refreshment stand was use under the No Fault Act. At the time of contracting for insurance in that case, the vehicle was a factory-modified mobile refreshment stand. Hall, 690 P.2d at 231 n. 4. Accordingly, use of the vehicle to serve refreshments was clearly a conceivable use inherent in the vehicle's nature and thus both the insured and the insurer assumed the risks associated with that use. In Titan Construction Co. v. Nolf, 183 Colo. 188, 515 P.2d 1123 (Colo.1973), we determined that the unloading and loading of cement from a ready-mix cement truck constituted a use within the meaning of a liability-to-third-persons policy provision because such use was inherent in the nature of the vehicle. See Id. at 193-94, 515 P.2d at 1125-26. In McMichael, we concluded that a road construction worker who was sawing concrete barriers in the median of a highway some distance in front of his truck was using his vehicle as contemplated by the UM policy. McMichael, 906 P.2d at 103. There, the vehicle was a truck with factory-equipped overhead beacon and emergency flashers. The claimant was using the truck as a barricade and as a warning to cars on the highway when a car accidentally hit him. Id. at 94. Because the truck had emergency warning equipment in place at the time the parties entered into the insurance contract, we concluded that use of the vehicle for warning purposes was conceivable and foreseeable at the time of contracting. Id. at 103. Although the term use is broad enough to cover activities beyond mere transportation, it is not so broad as to include acts that are clearly independent of a vehicle's operation. See 1 No Fault and Uninsured Motorist Automobile Insurance § 9.10[2] (Matthew Bender 1984, updated 2003). In all circumstances, the use in question should be one that is foreseeably identifiable with normal use of a vehicle as a vehicle. 1 Irvin E. Schermer, Automobile Liability Insurance § 7:2[2] (3d ed.1995, updated 2003). While our past cases have not specifically equated use with transportation, in situations where the vehicle was a non-commercial passenger vehicle, the focus of the use inquiry has undeniably been on its connection to transportation. As these cases suggest, unless articulated otherwise in the policy, the only use of a non-commercial passenger vehicle that is foreseeable or conceivable at the time of contracting for insurance is use as a means of transportation. In contrast to the commercial vehicles described above, a passenger vehicle has no obvious inherent use apart from its purpose as a mode of transportation. In Mason, we found that merely occupying or sitting in a parked car does not constitute a conceivable use for purposes of the insurance contract. Mason, 161 Colo. at 444, 423 P.2d at 24-25. By contrast, in Kohl, we held that transportation (including the loading and unloading) of hunters and their rifles was a conceivable and foreseeable use at the time an insurance policy was signed for a four-wheel drive vehicle. Kohl, 731 P.2d at 136. Finally, in Cung La, we determined that because both the claimant's and assailant's vehicles were proceeding down a highway at the time the assailant shot the claimant, the cars were being used as motor vehicles. Cung La, 830 P.2d at 1011. The conclusion from our cases is, thus, that absent some plain and obvious special purpose, the normal use of the ordinary passenger car is limited to transportation. Cases from other jurisdictions have articulated the transportation requirement more plainly. Requiring that at the time of the accident the vehicle was being used as a mode of transportation, these states give effect to the intent of their respective No Fault or UM statutes while recognizing the general purpose of contracting for automobile insurance. [3] See, e.g., McKenzie v. Auto Club Ins. Ass'n, 458 Mich. 214, 580 N.W.2d 424, 426 (1998) (Interpreting the statutory term use... as a motor vehicle, the court held we are convinced that the clear meaning of this part of the no fault act is that the Legislature intended coverage of injuries resulting from the use of motor vehicles when closely related to their transportational function and only when engaged in that function.); see also Ill. Farmers Ins. Co. v. League of Minn. Cities Ins. Trust, 617 N.W.2d 428, 429 (Minn. Ct.App.2000), (requiring that the vehicle being used must be in the business of transporting persons or property); see also Commercial Union Assurance Cos. v. Howard, 637 S.W.2d 647, 649 (Ky.1982) (Basic automobile insurance policies are intended to cover `driving' the vehicle, not repairing it. This additional field of coverage should be provided for by appropriate policies intended for that particular purpose.). On the other hand, many courts are more liberal than Colorado on this point. Like Colorado prior to McMichael, those courts tend to collapse the use determination into the causal determination by asking whether the injury is related to the use of the car without first determining what the use is. See, e.g., Blish v. Atlanta Cas. Co., 736 So.2d 1151, 1155 (Fla.1999) (holding in favor of the insured and reasoning that the insured's attack by strangers along the highway while changing his tire related to the use of the vehicle since the attack was an eminently foreseeable consequence of the use and maintenance of the insured's truck).