San Antonio Duty to Defend Lawyer

If you are sued, you usually should file an insurance claim immediately. With a valid insurance policy, your insurer has a legal duty to defend you if you’re sued. Yet, some insurance carriers refuse to defend policyholders. Or, sometimes they agree to defend you, but they state they reserve their right to later seek defense cost reimbursement or deny your coverage if they can prove your claim isn’t covered. Thankfully, a San Antonio duty to defend lawyer can help.

Under either scenario, contact Jon Michael Smith. I can help discuss your rights as a policyholder and know how to ensure your insurer defends your interests.

Reservation Of Rights Letter

Insurance policies usually address a carrier’s duty to defend, which means they have to provide you with a defense if you’re sued for a claim that’s covered by your policy. However, their duty to pay the damages is not always so broad.

A carrier may send a “reservation of rights” letter if they think your claim might not be covered. This letter is supposed to notify you that while your insurance company is providing you with a defense, they may still seek reimbursement for their costs of defending your claim or outright deny your coverage later based on later-obtained information.

This strategy allows an insurance company to gather additional information before they make their final determination of coverage. While they may not immediately deny your coverage, they simply want to ensure they can later deny coverage if they find sufficient grounds.

Your Possible Risks as an Insured

If your insurer later denies claim coverage, you may need to be prepared financially to bear the burden of defense costs for your suit. You can retain your own attorney, and it’s recommended you do so if you think the defense attorney hired by your insurance company has a potential conflict of interest.

You might feel like you can’t possibly get unbiased assistance from an attorney hired by your insurance carrier. You could retain your own attorney to protect your specific interest, since your insurance company may want to minimize its financial payouts to protect its own corporate interests.

Duty to Defend Data

The duty to defend cases falls within civil case filing data and contract claims since they’re based on insurance policies. Across the United States, filings for civil cases dropped approximately 33 percent in 2022 in our U.S. district courts. That year, there were about 309,102 cases. For contract cases, there were about 22,274 in 2022, which dropped about 22 percent. By 2024, there were about 28,392 contract actions across all U.S. District Courts.

With so many civil cases within our court system, you may need a Central Texas attorney to help with a duty to defend the claim.

Contact an Attorney

If your insurer has been delinquent in their duty to defend against a suit pursuant to your insurance policy, contact attorney Jon Michael Smith. I am a Board-Certified Lawyer in the state of Texas.

I speak directly to my clients, and I look forward to discussing your duty to defend concerns. My office is right near the Capital of Texas Highway (Loop 360) and US 183.

Contact my office for an initial consultation with a San Antonio duty-to-defend lawyer.