In any action against a nonadmitted foreign or alien insurer upon a contract of insurance issued or delivered in this State to a resident thereof or to a corporation authorized to do business therein, if the insurer has failed for 30 days after demand prior to the commencement of the action to make payment in accordance with the terms of the contract, and it appears to the court that such refusal was vexatious and without reasonable cause, the court may allow to the plaintiff a reasonable attorney fee and include such fee in any judgment that may be rendered in such action. Such fee shall not exceed 1212 percent of the amount which the court or jury finds the plaintiff is entitled to recover against the insurer, but in no event shall such fee be less than twenty-five dollars ($25). Failure of an insurer to defend any such action shall be deemed prima facie evidence that its failure to make payment was vexatious and without reasonable cause.
Cal. Ins. Code § 1619
Actions Against Nonadmitted Insurers
Applied in 3 court decisions — leading case 19 Cal. 3d 152 - Great Lakes Properties, Inc. v. City of El Segundo (1977)
Most recently applied in Stirling v. Agricultural Labor Relations Board (March 1987)
Added by Stats. 1949, Ch. 495.
How often courts cite this section
Court decisions citing this, by year. The dip in the last several years is a data-coverage gap, not a real trend — our corpus holds fewer opinions from the most recent years, so recent citations are undercounted.
Official source: California Legislative Information. Reproduced from public-domain California statutes; confirm against the official source for the current text. Not legal advice.