On August 13, 2025, the Second Department issued a decision in Spa Castle, Inc. v. Choice Agency Corp., 2025 NY Slip Op. 04676, holding that an insurance broker did not have a continuing duty to advise a client on appropriate coverage, explaining:
As a general principle, insurance brokers have a common-law duty to obtain requested coverage for their clients within a reasonable time or inform the client of the inability to do so. Absent a specific request for coverage not already in a client’s policy or the existence of a special relationship with the client, an insurance agent or broker has no continuing duty to advise, guide, or direct a client to obtain additional coverage.
Here, the defendant established its prima facie entitlement to judgment as a matter of law dismissing the complaint insofar as asserted against it by submitting, inter alia, transcripts of the deposition testimony of the plaintiffs’ CEO and president and the defendant’s vice president of operations, which demonstrated that the plaintiffs did not make a specific request for a particular kind of insurance coverage that the defendant failed to procure. The plaintiffs’ CEO and president testified, among other things, that he did not remember discussing specific risks that the plaintiffs were seeking to insure against, but that the plaintiffs needed general liability insurance. The defendant’s vice president of operations testified that the plaintiffs’ application was for general liability insurance, which the record reflects is the kind of insurance the defendant procured for the plaintiffs. In opposition, the plaintiffs failed to raise a triable issue of fact.
(Internal quotations and citations omitted).