The Delaware Supreme Court ruled that employees who were injured in work-related automobile accidents may file suit against their employer’s automobile liability insurer under their underinsured motorist provisions. The Court ruled that an insurance company issuing an automobile liability policy for a company’s vehicles, with coverage including underinsured motorist coverage, would not be an employer under the state’s Workers’ Compensation Act and could be liable for suits.

Two separate cases were consolidated, however both John Henry and Charles Fritz were employees injured in automobile accidents while operating an employer-owned vehicle during their employment and the accidents were caused by a third-party. They received workers’ compensation benefits from their employers. Both their employers had policies with Cincinnati Insurance Co. and the workers sought to recover underinsured-motorist benefits un the policies. A Superior Court granted Cincinnati’s motion for summary judgement, finding the exclusive remedy provision in effect at the time of the accident.

The Supreme Court disagreed, saying that the Act’s exclusive remedy provision does not prevent employees from receiving underinsured motorist benefits provided by an automobile liability policy that an employer purchased from a third-party company. The third-party is not an employer as defined in the Act. If a stranger’s negligence was the cause of an injury, the stranger should “not be in any degree absolved of his or her normal obligation to pay damages” and in these cases where there was underinsured motorist coverage, the insurance company acts as that tortfeasor. The Court permitted the suits.

Read the case here.