Read Your Policy: Even if You Don’t, the Court Will Assume You Did — or Should Have

Insurance policy forms are about as much fun to read as the tax code or your credit card agreement. Typically, these forms consist of various parts and pieces that refer back to one another and can only be made sense of using highlighters, sticky notes, and a diagram. Nevertheless, they are critically important documents that set forth your rights and responsibilities as an insured. The time to be familiar with what they say and how they work is before you suffer a catastrophic loss. Waiting to read your policy after the loss is a mistake, and it can be a costly one.