Insurance: policy documents.

Existing law requires an insurer, after a covered loss under a fire insurance policy, to provide the insured with a free copy of his or her policy within 30 calendar days of receiving a request from the insured, but allows the Insurance Commissioner to extend this period. Existing law also provides that an insured who does not experience a covered loss shall, upon request, be entitled to one free copy of his or her policy annually. This bill would specify that the copy of the policy provided shall be a complete copy of the policy in effect at the time of the loss and shall include the full policy, any endorsements to the policy, and the policy declarations page. The bill would authorize an insurer that is not compliant with specified electronic document transmission requirements to provide a copy of the entire policy in electronic form if the covered loss is the result of a state of emergency and the electronic copy is requested by an insured who has not elected to receive electronic documents. The bill would require an insurer that is compliant with those requirements to provide an electronic copy of the entire policy if the same criteria are met. The bill would provide that request by an insured under these circumstances is not a request to receive future electronic communications.