A Video Explaining That the EUO is A Duty Owed by the Insured to the Insurer

The Examination Under Oath is a Condition Precedent to Recovery of Benefits from a Policy

Every fire insurance policy issued in the U.S., like the New York Standard Fire Insurance Policy quoted in Chapter 1, provides that, in the event of a loss, the insurance company can require the insured to produce documents and testify at an “EUO.” By statute in those states like New York that have a standard fire insurance policy, also require that all risk or direct risk of physical loss policies that do not exclude fire, must provide the coverages or better than the coverages stated in the standard fire policy.

In Ransom v. Selective Ins. Co., 229 N.J. Super. 43, 46, 550 A.2d 1006 (Law Div.1988) the court reviewed the examination under oath provision in a policy and concluded that the insured was required to submit to the EUO and produce requested documents in accordance with the written demand of counsel “because the circumstances surrounding the loss ar
ouse[d] a justified suspicion of arson and because the requests are specific, relevant, material and reasonable.” (Emphasis added).

The purpose of examinations under oath that was first described in Claflin v. Commonwealth Insurance Co., 110 U.S. 81, 94-95 (1884) made clear that every question that was relevant and pertinent in such an examination was material to the investigation of the insurer must be answered. It also clarified that a question is material when, “a true answer to it was of the substance of the obligation of the assured.”