Two years is too long to wait before reporting an EEOC charge to your EPL carrier, according to a recent a court decision from the Western District of Virginia. A company’s employment practices liability policy defined “employment claim” to include “a formal administrative or regulatory proceeding commenced by the filing of a notice of charges…including…a proceeding before the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission” and it required that notice of a claim be given to the carrier “as soon as practicable.”  The company received notice in April 2011 that a former employee had filed a charge with the EEOC alleging employment discrimination, but it did not report the charge to its carrier. More than a year later, after initially dismissing the charge, the EEOC found reasonable cause to believe discrimination had occurred and ordered the parties to engage in mediation in March 2013. The company waited another five months – to February 2013, nearly two years from the date of the original charge – before informing the carrier of the pending mediation. The carrier denied coverage due to the delayed report.
Continue Reading Don’t Wait Too Long: Failure to Give Timely Notice Under an EPL Policy May Preclude Coverage as a Matter of Law