Insurance law (excluding Marine insurance law)

LWM22

This course in Insurance Law (excluding Marine Insurance Law) introduces you to the essential features and principles of English insurance law and insurance contracts. Insurance is a remarkable sector; globally payments for insurance premiums amount to over 4 trillion dollars each year, which is 7% of the world gross domestic product. This course explores what insurance law is, how it works and its purpose.

Study as an individual course

Module A: Elements of insurance

LWM22A

The insurance contract
Insurance regulation in the United Kingdom
Insurance intermediaries

Module B: Insurance contract formation

LWM22B

Non-disclosure and misrepresentation; remedies for breach
Formation of the contract including: offer, acceptance, premiums

Module C: The insurance contract and its terms

LWM22C

Insurable interest in property insurance and life assurance
Terms of the contract
Construing the insurance contract

Module D: Claims process

LWM22D

Causation: determining the cause of the loss; losses caused by the insured
Claims: the claims process, the requirement of good faith
Subrogation: the insurer's, the insured's and the other parties' rights
Abandonment
Double insurance and contribution between insurers
Indemnity and reinstatement, mitigation of loss, reinstatement under contract and under statute
Alternative dispute resolution mechanisms: the ombudsman

Assessment

Each module is assessed by a 45-minute unseen written exam.

Sequence

It is strongly recommended you take Module A first, and Module D last.

How to apply

You can apply to study a module individually as a standalone unit or as part of a Postgraduate Certificate, Postgraduate Diploma or Master of Laws qualification. (In either scenario, they must be studied in order.)

These modules also contribute towards the following specialist pathways for Laws:

Commercial and Corporate Law
Common Law
Financial Services Law
Insurance Law
International Business Law

Apply via Postgraduate Laws.

Professor John Lowry

Professor John Lowry is the Course Convenor for Corporate finance and management issues in company law and Foundational and constitutional issues in company law.

John joined the UCL Faculty of Laws in 2004 having moved from the Centre for Commercial Law Studies at Queen Mary University, London. He has taught law in Hong Kong, the USA (New Jersey) and practised in Canada specialising in corporate litigation. He has written widely in domestic and international journals on directors’ fiduciary obligations, shareholder remedies and insurance law. He is the Company Law section editor for the Journal of Business Law and the Case Review editor for International Corporate Rescue. He is also an editor of The Company Lawyer and has been a contributing editor to Gore-Browne on Companies. During 2000-2002 he was an Associate Senior Research Fellow at the Institute of Advanced Legal Studies. In 2001 he was a Visiting Fellow at the University of Connecticut, Centre for Insurance Law Research and is an Honorary Fellow at Monash University. In 2016 John was appointed the Cheng Yu Tung Visiting Professor at the University of Hong Kong.