Court Opinion

ID: 9630242
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-22 10:06:01.601854+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:40:50.517293
License: Public Domain

ALMA WILSON, Justice,
dissenting in Part II:
The question is simply whether an insurer has a duty to offer an insured increased *73limits of uninsured motorist coverage and if so what is the legal effect of the insurer's failure to make the offer. 36 O.S. § 3636(B) plainly provides that “... increased limits of liability shall be offered and purchased if desired....” [emphasis added]. The legislature mandates the duty to make an offer. Our judicial function is to apply the statutory language and it is fundamental that the word “shall” is a word of command operating to impose a mandatory duty.
The legal effect of the insurer’s failure to make an offer results in a reformation of the policy and an increase in available uninsured motorist coverage to an amount equal to the liability limits available under the policy. In this Court’s recent decision in Moon v. Guarantee Ins. Co., 764 P.2d 1331, 1335 (Okla.1988) we said:
Accordingly, uninsured motorist coverage is required to be offered by written provision within or supplemental to an original policy, (and if not so “offered”, then such is written into the policy by operation of law), and must likewise thereafter be waived by written rejection. Thus, the burden of proof is upon the insurer to come forward with a written rejection in order to relieve the insurer from its duty to provide the statutory uninsured motorist coverage. Allegations of oral offers of uninsured motorist coverage fall short of the tendor of proof required by 36 O.S.1981 § 3636, for there is but one statutorily sanctioned method by which the mandatory uninsured motorist coverage provided for persons insured under a liability policy may thereafter be rejected, [emphasis added.]
Although Moon is distinguishable from the case at bar in that it did not address the increased limits feature of § 3636(B), I deem it controlling. In my dissenting opinion in Mann v. Farmers Ins. Co., 761 P.2d 460, 466 (Okla.1988), I reiterate that Subsection F of § 3636 which provides for written rejection of uninsured motorist coverage refers to all of Subsection B of § 3636 (i.e. the increased limits) and not just the portion of Subsection B requiring that the policy coverage be the minimum required by state law.
The case at bar is distinguishable from the authority relied upon by the majority. For example, in Mann v. Farmers Ins. Co., 761 P.2d at 460, the insurer made a sufficient offer of increased limits of uninsured motorist coverage whereas in the instant case no offer was made. Furthermore, the case at bar involves a primary policy whereas this Court in Moser v. Liberty Mutual Ins. Co., 731 P.2d 406 (Okla.1986) dealt with the applicability of the requirements of § 3636 to umbrella liability policies.
To reiterate my dissent in Moser at 410-11 “[t]his Court has traditionally held that an unambiguous statute should be construed in a literal way giving words their ordinary, commonly understood meaning.” It is hard to imagine words plainer than “increased limits of liability shall be offered.” Accordingly, under the provisions of our own statute, there is neither reason nor room for statutory construction. The statute unambiguously mandates the duty to offer increased limits of liability. The failure to do so renders the insurer responsible for uninsured motorist coverage in an amount equal to the bodily injury liability contained in the policy by operation of law. The legislated mandated duty is not discharged by the insured’s nebulous awareness of the availability of increased coverage. This Court should not substitute its wisdom for that of the legislature. I therefore dissent and adhere to the plain meaning of the statute.
I have been authorized to state that KAUGER, J. joins in this dissenting in part II.