pollution insurance

Working on a fine point of Texas law
They're not there yet, but Great American Insurance Company has taken the position that it will only pay death benefits in fires to people who were actually roasted by flames. The company has an exclusion in its policy for death by "pollution," y'know, greenhouse gases, vinyl chloride and fertilizer runoff in water, things like that, and it says, well, smoke is air pollution, so no benefits for fire victims who merely asphyxiate. Houston Chronicle

Who We Are
Alex Boese Alex is the creator and curator of the Museum of Hoaxes. He's also the author of various weird, non-fiction, science-themed books such as Elephants on Acid and Psychedelic Apes. Paul Di Filippo Paul has been paid to put weird ideas into fictional form for over forty years, in his career as a noted science fiction writer. Contact Us

Posted By: Chuck - Thu Dec 18, 2008
Category:

Comments

I smell a HUGE class-action suit acomin'.

Posted by Expat47 in Athens, Greece on 12/18/08 at 09:11 AM

OOPs! Sorry, just noticed that it's Texas.

I hear a HUGE can of whoopass being opened!

Posted by Expat47 in Athens, Greece on 12/18/08 at 09:12 AM

If this trend continues, people will be paying premiums for absoluteley no coverage. At what point does it become extorsion?

Posted by Matt in Florida on 12/18/08 at 10:00 AM

Is Great American publicly owned? If so, this is just one more case of what one gets when one cares more about dividends for stock holders than providing a service for customers. Exactly what has screwed up health care and insurance.

Posted by larriann on 12/18/08 at 11:42 AM

Wow, it's like they fully know they're assholes, they know people see them as assholes, so they don't even try to pretend anymore.

Posted by kingmonkey in Athens, Ontario on 12/18/08 at 12:33 PM

kingmonkey - with the current state of the economy I don't think anyone can afford to pretend anymore.

Posted by Madd Maxx on 12/18/08 at 12:39 PM

There's an additional premium for pretense?

Posted by kingmonkey in Athens, Ontario on 12/18/08 at 12:51 PM

Commenting is not available in this channel entry.