Life Insurance

As a national boutique law firm, Jorden Burt serves the needs of the life insurance industry in connection with life, annuity, pension and credit insurance businesses. We have represented life insurance companies throughout the United States in national "bet the company" class action and complex commercial litigation cases. Our attorneys are recognized as not just "litigators" but as experienced trial lawyers who have the depth to efficiently and creatively defend against both traditional and new issues raised by plaintiff lawyers under state and federal law.

The Life Insurance Industry Group works closely with our practice teams to provide counseling, litigation and dispute resolution to life insurers in the securities, ERISA, federal tax and state regulatory areas on product development, sales and distribution issues, business combinations and state regulatory advice, market conduct examinations and hearings. We bring an integrated and complementary approach in servicing our life insurance clients by drawing on the collective experience of our business, regulatory, and litigation attorneys.

Jorden Burt and its lawyers have been recognized in numerous journals as authorities in life insurance industry matters, including in a recent BTI "Power Elite" Survey of General Counsel at Fortune 1000 companies. Jorden Burt was recognized as a "Short List" firm in the "Client Votes of Confidence: Go-To Law Firms" category as well as a "Recommended Law Firm" in the "Client Advocates: Law Firms that Clients Recommend" category. Jorden Burt was also recognized as both a "Short List" and "Predominant Recommended Firm" in the insurance industry.

Litigation and Dispute Resolution Services

JORDEN BURT litigators have represented life insurance clients in federal and state court venues, at all stages of litigation, primarily as lead defense counsel, but also as the initiator of actions, pursuing claims on our clients' behalf. Our experience includes disposal of actions, including putative class actions, at the earliest stages of the litigation, as well as bench and jury trials of major class and mass actions and high dollar individual civil cases and criminal cases. We also have worked as relief counsel where a client experienced an adverse result while represented by other counsel. In addition, we have preserved trial court wins on appeal, and obtained appellate reversals of adverse rulings, including certifications of class actions.

Teams consisting of lawyers with trial, appellate, and criminal litigation experience work together to develop effective litigation strategies and solutions. Our dispute resolution attorneys have a wide range of experience representing life insurance clients in arbitration and mediation proceedings conducted under various arbitration rules. Our business and regulatory attorneys regularly collaborate with our litigators in helping clients to identify, evaluate and mitigate potential litigation risks in their businesses. Likewise, our litigators draw on our business and regulatory attorneys' experience with insurance products, business operations, distribution, and industry practice not only to fashion effective litigation strategies, but also to craft authoritative briefs and other court filings, often involving the development of novel theories that promote our client's litigation interests. JORDEN BURT prides itself on having substantial databases drawn from the firm's extensive litigation practice for life insurers as well as many other industry sources.

We have represented our insurance clients as lead counsel in a variety of litigation and dispute resolution matters including:

• Life and Annuity Sales Practices - including class action and individual cases alleging misleading and deceptive sales practices and breaches of duty pursuant to a variety of theories of liability related to life, annuity, and retirement products. We have defended clients in cases involving:

  • Annuity products with a bonus feature, regarding the extent to which the bonus is available upon surrender, the impact of the bonus on subsequent crediting rates, and related disclosures,

  • Future premium payments to keep whole life and universal life policies in force,

  • Changes in and the composition of the cost of insurance rates in life policies,

  • Charges and fees for state premium taxes and other charges in annuity contracts and life policies,

  • The insurer's discretion to set various rates and charges in annuity contract and life policies,

  • Annuity contract and life insurance replacement sales,

  • Cost of insurance rates for juveniles life policies,

  • Administrative charges for periodic premium payments for life policies,

  • Life policies used in connection with retirement or private pension plans, and

  • Low face value life insurance policies sold for socio-economic, and non-discriminatory, reasons.

• Producer and Employment Litigation - including cases involving alleged sales misrepresentations, forgery, and tortious interference claims against competitors for hiring away agents; agent termination cases; and breach of contract, tort, and discrimination suits brought by agents and employees.

• ERISA - including individual and class actions alleging ERISA violations in connection with our clients' variable annuities, life products used for retirement planning, and pension products. We have successfully defended fiduciary liability claims. Our partners authored the Handbook on ERISA Litigation, published by Aspen Law & Business.

• Credit Insurance - including class action and individual cases involving credit life, disability, unemployment, and other types of financial guaranty products.

Insurance Business Counseling

JORDEN BURT business and regulatory attorneys counsel life insurance clients on a variety of transactions, business arrangements, insurance products, and distribution matters under the federal and state securities laws, FINRA regulations, and state insurance laws. Our lawyers have worked with the various state and federal regulators. JORDEN BURT attorneys counsel insurance industry clients on business matters in the following key areas:

• Product Design - including working with actuaries and product filing staff for fixed index annuities, variable products, market-value-adjustment products, synthetic annuities, and other innovative products.

• Securities Regulation - including status questions under the Securities Act, Securities Exchange Act and Investment Company Act of 1940 (1940 Act); 1940 Act regulation of separate accounts and mutual funds that serve as underlying investment vehicles for insurance products; and compliance with the federal and state securities laws, including the Sarbanes-Oxley Act.

• State Insurance Regulation - including contract and form filings; licensing of insurance companies, producers, managing general agents, underwriters, and consultants; and compliance with required contract terms, standard nonforfeiture law, disclosure, replacement, suitability, unfair trade practice, and other requirements.
  Compliance Oversight and Best Practices - including administrative and operational compliance with state and federal regulatory requirements, mock regulatory examinations, and development of industry best practices.

• Distribution and Marketing - including structuring arrangements between insurance companies and banks, brokerage firms, and marketing organizations; and assistance with FINRA regulation of member firms and producers.

• Market Conduct Examinations and Regulatory Investigations - including responding to initial regulatory findings and initiating and participating in contested case hearings.

• Advertising Review - including substantive reviews for compliance with both state insurance and federal securities laws and regulations; assistance with state and FINRA filings; and assistance with responding to and resolving regulatory comments.

• Organization and Transactions - including life insurance company formation, mergers and acquisitions through stock and asset acquisition, including reinsurance arrangements, reorganizations, and dissolutions; and separate account transfers and reorganizations.
  Privacy and Data Security Regulations - including compliance with SEC Regulation S-P and state insurance privacy requirements.

• Private and Public Offerings and Financial Reporting - including, SEC registered offerings and private placement U.S. and off-shore offerings of insurance securities products, and Exchange Act financial reporting.

• Tax and ERISA - including a broad range of matters relating to qualified and non-qualified retirement plans, health and other welfare benefit plans, annuities and IRAs, including the tax qualification of annuities and life insurance contracts; represent clients before the Internal Revenue Service and the Department of Labor.