Clients ask us all the time: when are you going to get the settlement monies once the case resolves.
Per section 627.4265, the insurance company has to tender payment within 20 days after the case is settled, although the parties can agree otherwise. The insurance company can conditioned payment on an executed release (which would mark the end of the case) but if they don’t tender the money timely then the insurance company would owe interest at 12 percent from the date of the agreement.
Many insurance companies will, once the case resolves, send us both the release and the check. Other companies will require the release before they will issue the case.
627.4265 Payment of settlement.—In any case in which a person and an insurer have agreed in writing to the settlement of a claim, the insurer shall tender payment according to the terms of the agreement no later than 20 days after such settlement is reached. The tender of payment may be conditioned upon execution by such person of a release mutually agreeable to the insurer and the claimant, but if the payment is not tendered within 20 days, or such other date as the agreement may provide, it shall bear interest at a rate of 12 percent per year from the date of the agreement; however, if the tender of payment is conditioned upon the execution of a release, the interest shall not begin to accrue until the executed release is tendered to the insurer.History.—s. 12, ch. 83-288; s. 3, ch. 84-94; s. 114, ch. 92-318.
