Calif. Interior Design Store’s COVID-19 Coverage Action Survives Dismissal Motion

PHILADELPHIA — A Pennsylvania federal judge has allowed an interior design store’s COVID-19 coverage action to proceed against ACE Fire Underwriters Insurance Co., ruling it is unclear as to whether the policy phrase “direct physical loss of or damage” encompasses loss of use and operations.

In a May 7 order, Senior Judge Berle M. Schiller of the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania found “it is a reasonable interpretation of the Business Income insurance language that the ability to operate a business, and generate Business Income, is one of the sticks in the bundle of property rights …