Book I: Contracts

In liability insurance, the insurer is only liable if, as a result of the event covered by the policy, an out-of-court or legal claim is made against the insured by the injured third party.

For the purposes of this chapter, a claim is any loss or damage or a series of losses or damage caused to third parties for which the insured is liable, resulting from a harmful event and giving rise to one or more claims. The harmful event is the cause of the damage. A series of harmful events with the same technical cause is treated as a single harmful event.

The insurer may stipulate that no acknowledgement of liability or settlement made outside the insurer may be set up against it. The admission of the materiality of a fact cannot be equated with an admission of liability.

The injured third party has a direct right of action against the insurer covering the civil liability of the person liable. The insurer may not pay to anyone other than the injured party all or part of the sum owed by it, until the injured party has been reimbursed, up to the amount of the said sum, for the pecuniary consequences of the harmful event which gave rise to the…

In the case provided for in article L. 25-1 of the Highway Code, as stated in that article, “the insurer of the owner of the vehicle is obliged to guarantee, within the limits of the contract, compensation for the damage caused to the third party, subject to recourse, if necessary, against the public authority which, by its act, caused the damage giving rise to the insurer’s liability, and without any…

Depending on the choice of the parties, cover is triggered either by the harmful event or by the claim. However, when it covers the liability of natural persons outside their professional activity, cover is triggered by the harmful event. A decree of the Conseil d’Etat may also impose one of these methods for other types of cover. Depending on the case, the contract must reproduce the text of the third…