The High Court has ruled on a preliminary limitation question in a dispute between Joseph Edwards and Ark Life Assurance Company Limited over a life insurance policy. The judgment leaves several questions, including whether the plaintiff’s claims are statute barred, for the trial judge.
The insurer applied to have the court determine whether the proceedings were statute barred. The policy was issued on 22 June 1999 as a joint life, last-survivor plan covering Edwards and his wife, Mary Edwards. The judgment records a monthly premium of £827.11 (€1,050).
Edwards claims the premium was to be reviewed after four years and reduced to an initially estimated £232.50. His wife died on 22 June 2003. The insurer argued that the claim arose on her death and, as a claim for breach of contract and misrepresentation, the limitation period expired on 22 June 2009.
Edwards relied on mistake, or alternatively estoppel and breach of fiduciary duty. He claimed the insurer’s staff or agents entered the policy on its system as a single-life policy rather than a joint-life, last-survivor policy. He said he discovered the mistake on receiving a letter dated 12 June 2006. The judgment states that the court found the claim based on that alleged mistake fell within section 72 of the Statute of Limitations Act 1957, under which time does not begin to run until the mistake is discovered or could reasonably have been discovered.
The court also rejected Edwards’s argument that the insurer’s letter of 25 September 2009, consenting to referral to the Financial Services Ombudsman’s Office, prevented it from pleading the statute. The judge held that the letter was not an acknowledgment and did not restrict the insurer from relying on the limitation defence.
For the estoppel and fiduciary-duty claims, the court held that these were equitable remedies covered by section 11(9). The insurer could rely on laches in defending those claims, but could not plead the statute against them.
The judgment did not decide whether estoppel could be used as a sword rather than a shield, or whether the claims arose only in contract or misrepresentation. Those questions were left to the trial judge. If the claims are found to be contractual or based on misrepresentation, the trial judge may consider applying the statute or restricting the claim to six years of premiums calculated from the date proceedings were issued.