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Need a Lyft? Georgia Court of Appeals Decision Raises Coverage Questions for Ridesharing Services and Their Drivers

2/19/18

By: Connor M. Bateman
Most personal automobile insurance policies exclude coverage for damages that result from the ownership or operation of a vehicle used as a “public or livery conveyance.” Although typically undefined in the policy, this phrase has generally been understood to encompass vehicles that are “used indiscriminately in conveying the public, rather than being limited to certain persons and particular occasions or governed by special terms.”
The Georgia Court of Appeals recently weighed in on the scope of this exclusion in Haulers Insurance Co. v. Davenport.  In Davenport, the plaintiff sustained injuries in a car accident, sued the other driver, and served his uninsured motorist carrier (Haulers) with a copy of the complaint. At the time of the collision, the plaintiff was giving a ride to a female friend who would occasionally pay the plaintiff to drive her into town. There was no evidence, however, that the plaintiff ever offered paid rides to the general public. The Court of Appeals rejected Haulers’ argument that the policy’s public or livery exclusion barred coverage, reasoning that the exclusion was inapplicable absent evidence that the plaintiff “used his vehicle indiscriminately to transport members of the general public for hire, or regularly rented out his vehicle for hire.” The court recognized, however, that the exclusion would apply in cases where the driver “presents his services indiscriminately to the general public for hire.”
In light of the rising popularity of Transportation Network Companies (“TNCs”) such as Lyft and Uber, the coverage issues presented by this oft-forgotten exclusion should be carefully reexamined. TNC drivers, who use their personal vehicles to transport passengers, will often have no coverage under their personal policies due to the public or livery conveyance exclusion. This exclusion clearly applies to drivers actively transporting passengers and may even be triggered when the driver is simply using the ridesharing application to “troll” for potential customers. While some of these gaps have been addressed by commercial insurance policies provided by the TNCs, drivers may still be left without coverage in certain situations. For instance, although TNCs typically provide liability coverage for a driver who has the app turned on and is waiting to accept a ride, the TNC policies will not likely cover damages caused by someone or something else during that initial period. To account for this, the TNCs suggest that such damages may be covered by the at-fault driver’s policy or the TNC driver’s personal policy. However, the public or livery conveyance exclusion often extends to uninsured motorist, collision, and comprehensive coverage. And because courts have held that the public or livery conveyance exclusion applies when drivers “present their services” to the general public, the exclusion is arguably triggered even when the TNC driver is merely waiting for the application to connect to a customer.
Although the reach of this exclusion has yet to be fully examined in the context of ride-sharing services, these and other coverage issues will likely continue to arise. For additional information, please contact Connor Bateman at cbateman@fmglaw.com.