Florida Statute 627.4137: Insurance Disclosure Duties and Remedies

Florida Statute 627.4137 gives anyone with a potential liability claim the right to obtain key insurance information before filing suit. Within 30 days of receiving a written request from the claimant or the claimant’s attorney, a liability insurer must produce a sworn statement identifying the insurer, every named insured, the policy limits, any coverage defenses it believes it can raise, and a complete copy of the policy itself. The rule reaches primary policies as well as excess and umbrella coverage.¹

What the Insurer Must Disclose

The sworn statement has to come from a corporate officer, claims manager, or superintendent, and it must cover five categories of information for every known liability policy that could pay some or all of the claim:

The name of each insurance company providing coverage.
Every person or entity listed as an insured.
The dollar limits of liability coverage.
Any policy defense the insurer reasonably believes it can raise at the time of the statement.
A complete copy of the policy.

Because the response is given under oath, the person signing attests to its accuracy under penalty of perjury. That makes it much harder for an insurer to later characterize an omitted policy or understated limit as a clerical mistake.¹

The requirement to disclose coverage defenses up front is one of the more useful features of the statute. Instead of finding out mid-litigation that the insurer plans to rely on an exclusion, you learn about it early enough to evaluate the defense, prepare a response, or redirect the claim toward another source of recovery such as underinsured motorist coverage.

How to Send the Request

The disclosure duty is triggered by a written request, and no lawsuit needs to be pending. The statute reaches “any claim which might be made,” so a request can go out as soon as you have a potential claim against someone with liability coverage.¹

You have options on where to send it. The request can go directly to the insurer, or to the insured person, or to the insurance agent. When it goes to the insured or the agent, they have their own obligation under the statute: they must disclose the name and coverage of every known insurer and forward the request to each affected insurance company. Once the insurer receives the forwarded request, the 30-day clock starts.¹

The Certified Mail Rule for Self-Insured Corporations

If the responsible entity is self-insured rather than covered by a traditional carrier, the statute imposes an extra procedural step. The request has to be sent by certified mail to the corporation’s registered agent. Regular mail or email will not satisfy that requirement, and a self-insured corporation that never receives a properly routed request has no obligation to respond.¹

The Duty to Keep the Statement Current

The insurer’s job doesn’t end with the initial response. Under subsection (2), the sworn statement must be amended immediately when the insurer learns of facts that change what it previously provided. If another policy comes to light, if the limits turn out to differ from what was originally stated, or if a new coverage defense surfaces, the insurer cannot sit on that information and wait for another request.¹

This ongoing duty matters most in complex claims involving several policies or evolving coverage questions. If you settled on the basis of the original disclosure and later discover additional coverage the insurer knew about, the statute’s amendment requirement gives you stronger footing to challenge that outcome.

What Happens If the Insurer Ignores the Request

Section 627.4137 does not itself list a specific penalty for blowing the 30-day deadline. The consequences come through Florida’s bad faith statute, section 624.155, which lets any person damaged by an insurer’s failure to settle claims in good faith bring a civil action for damages beyond the policy limits. A stonewalled or delayed disclosure request becomes evidence in that action.²

The Civil Remedy Notice

Before filing a bad faith suit, you have to complete a procedural step. A Civil Remedy Notice must be filed with the Florida Department of Financial Services at least 60 days before bringing the action. The notice has to identify the specific statutory violation, the facts giving rise to it, and any relevant policy language. If the insurer pays the damages owed or corrects the violation inside the 60-day window, the bad faith action cannot proceed.²

The Department of Financial Services runs an online filing system for Civil Remedy Notices and requires parties to use it.³

How the 2023 Tort Reform Changed the Picture

Florida’s 2023 tort reform legislation (HB 837) reshaped the bad faith framework around disclosure disputes. Negligence alone is no longer enough to establish insurer bad faith. The law also imposes a good faith duty on claimants and their representatives when furnishing information, making demands, and setting deadlines. And a liability insurer that tenders the lesser of the policy limits or the demanded amount within 90 days of receiving actual notice of a claim with sufficient supporting evidence gets a safe harbor from bad faith liability.

For a 627.4137 dispute, that means an insurer that misses the 30-day window but promptly corrects course may have a stronger defense against a bad faith claim than it would have before 2023. An insurer that ignores the request and then refuses to settle, by contrast, has produced the kind of record that supports a bad faith theory.

Why the Statute Covers Umbrella and Excess Policies

The statute explicitly reaches “each known policy of insurance, including excess or umbrella insurance.” That language matters because umbrella policies often provide millions of dollars in coverage sitting above the primary policy. A disclosure that names only the primary limits leaves a fundamentally incomplete picture of what is available to pay the claim, and Florida’s statute closes off any argument that umbrella coverage falls outside the disclosure duty.¹

If Your Case Is in Federal Court

When a Florida liability claim lands in federal court, a different disclosure obligation applies. Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 26(a)(1)(A)(iv) requires each party to provide, as part of initial disclosures, any insurance agreement under which an insurer may be liable to satisfy a judgment or to reimburse payments made toward one. The federal rule is automatic; no written request is needed.⁴

The timing works differently too. Initial disclosures under Rule 26 come within 14 days of the parties’ discovery planning conference rather than 30 days from a specific request. Parties joined later have 30 days from service or joinder. The federal rule often produces insurance information sooner once a case is filed, but it does not reach the pre-suit situations that 627.4137 covers.⁴

1
Florida Senate. Florida Code 627.4137 – Disclosure of Certain Information Required
2
Florida Senate. Florida Code 624.155 – Civil Remedy
3
Florida Department of Financial Services. Civil Remedy and Required Legal Notices
4
Legal Information Institute (LII). Federal Rules of Civil Procedure Rule 26 – Duty to Disclose; General Provisions Governing Discovery