Vancouver Furniture Co. v. Industrial Indemnity Co.

704 P.2d 518, 74 Or. App. 642
CourtCourt of Appeals of Oregon
DecidedAugust 7, 1986
DocketA8204-02247; CA A32277
StatusPublished
Cited by2 cases

This text of 704 P.2d 518 (Vancouver Furniture Co. v. Industrial Indemnity Co.) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Appeals of Oregon primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Vancouver Furniture Co. v. Industrial Indemnity Co., 704 P.2d 518, 74 Or. App. 642 (Or. Ct. App. 1986).

Opinion

RICHARDSON, P. J.

Defendant insurer appeals from a judgment for plaintiff in this action on a fire insurance policy to recover for business interruption losses. The judgment is based on an order granting plaintiffs motion for partial summary judgment. The essence of the dispute under defendant’s first assignment is which of two alternative amounts of damages found by an appraisal panel is recoverable by plaintiff. Defendant also assigns error to the trial court’s award of attorney fees to plaintiff. We affirm.

Plaintiff operates two retail furniture stores in Vancouver, Washington. The parties refer to them respectively as the “downtown store” and the “warehouse store.” The policy in question covers the downtown store. In October, 1981, there was a fire at that store, with resulting water damage to the building and inventory. During the 168-day period that the downtown store was unusable, plaintiff transferred sales personnel from the downtown store to the warehouse store. Plaintiff submitted a claim for business interruption loss. Defendant disputed the amount claimed and, pursuant to the policy, the issue was submitted to appraisal.1

The policy provides:

“5. RESUMPTION OF OPERATIONS: It is a condition of this insurance that if the Insured could reduce the loss resulting from the interruption of business,
“(a) by complete or partial resumption of operations of the property herein described, whether damaged or not, or
[645]*645“(b) by making use of other property at the location^) described herein or elsewhere,
“such reduction shall be taken into account in arriving at the amount of loss hereunder.
“6. EXPENSE TO REDUCE LOSS: This policy covers such expenses as are necessarily incurred for the purpose of reducing any loss under this policy (EXCEPT EXPENSES INCURRED TO EXTINGUISH A FIRE) NOT EXCEEDING, HOWEVER, THE AMOUNT BY WHICH THE LOSS HEREUNDER IS THEREBY REDUCED.”

The appraisers found:

“1. The amount of business interruption loss if only the downtown location is considered:
$504,000.00
“2. In the exercise of due diligence and dispatch, how many days of suspension of operations occurred at the downtown store location at 1101 Broadway, as a result of the water damage loss of October 24,1981?
8 days total suspension
160 days partial suspension
168 days (Total)
“3. The amount of business interruption loss if both the downtown and warehouse locations are considered, considering that no expenses were incurred for the purpose of reducing the loss:
$175,200.00
“Note re: Answer No. 3: If delivery and handling, advertising; selling and general and administrative expenses are deemed to have been incurred for the purpose of reducing the loss, the loss considering both locations was $504,000.00.”

After the appraisers filed their findings, plaintiffs attorney requested clarification about two matters:

“1. Since the Broadway store, itself, was not capable of resuming partial operations after eight days, I understand that the partial suspension figure in question 2 of the appraisal award represents a determination that the increased sales at the warehouse retail store were taken into account as the basis for determining that the Broadway store had ‘partial suspension’.
[646]*646“2. The delivery and handling, advertising, selling and general and administrative expenses referred to in the note following the answer to question No. 3 of the appraisal award refer to the expenses not normally incurred in connection with the ‘normal’ warehouse sales, but were the expenses incurred in connection with the increased warehouse sales during the time the Broadway store was out of operation.” (Emphasis in original.)

The umpire confirmed the attorney’s understanding of the first matter. As to the second, he stated:

“I believe that the appraisal panel found that the insured incurred no expenses beyond what it would normally have incurred. If, however, a court were to hold that such expenses incurred at the warehouse should be considered, even though not beyond what would normally have been incurred in regular operations, our award would be as stated in the comment to Question No. 3 of the appraisal award.” (Emphasis in original.)

The trial court awarded plaintiff damages equal to $504,000, less the amounts defendant had tendered. Defendant argues that plaintiff was entitled to recover only the $175,200 that had been tendered. Defendant contends that, under the “resumption of operations” provision of the policy, plaintiff was required to and did make use of its second facility to carry on the operations of the downtown store. It was therefore not entitled to recover the amount of loss that the appraisers found on the basis of their consideration of the downtown store alone. According to defendant, plaintiff is entitled only to the amount of loss that the appraisers found on the basis of their consideration of both stores, without any adjustment for expenses, because plaintiffs expenses did not go beyond “what would normally have been incurred in regular operations” and the expenses were, therefore, not reimbursable under the “expense to reduce loss” provision of the contract.

Plaintiff argues that the policy covered only the downtown location, that plaintiff was not required to make use of the separately-insured warehouse facility to comply with the “resumption of operations” provision, and that plaintiff is therefore entitled to compensation for the loss the appraisers found for the downtown facility alone. Plaintiff contends alternatively that, if it was required to use the [647]*647warehouse facility for “mitigating sales,” it is entitled “to reimbursement or offset for the expenses incurred in making those mitigation sales.” Finally, plaintiff states in response to defendant’s argument concerning the “expense to reduce loss” provision:

“* * * Defendant’s conclusion is that the appraisal panel ‘determined that none of the expenses incurred by Plaintiff at the warehouse retail store during the resumption of its downtown store’s operations were the kind of expenses that fall within the “Expense To Reduce Loss” provision of the insurance contract’. In fact, the appraisal panel recognized that it was not its function to ‘determine’ legal issues. The appraisal panel left for subsequent judicial determination what types of expenses were or were not covered by the ‘Expense To Reduce Loss’ provision; the panel merely found that no ‘extraordinary’ expenses were incurred but that sales expenses related to the ‘mitigating’ sales were incurred which restored the amount of business interruption loss to the sum of $504,000.00. Since the policy does not require reimbursable expenses to be ‘extraordinary,’ those expenses are reimbursable to plaintiff. Defendant’s repeated reassertions that reimbursable expenses must be extraordinary expenses simply have no source in defendant’s policy provisions.”

We agree with plaintiffs conclusion regarding the deduction of expenses.

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Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
704 P.2d 518, 74 Or. App. 642, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/vancouver-furniture-co-v-industrial-indemnity-co-orctapp-1986.