WELCOME to the RAA’s Reinsurance Case Law and Contract Clause Database.

Download the Database User Guide

What is it?
An online database where reinsurance professionals can quickly retrieve summaries of reinsurance case rulings or a court’s discussion of the wording of a particular contract provision, or both.

Case Summaries
You can search the database using everyday reinsurance terms, or “keywords,” to quickly find summaries of cases that deal with your issues.

Contract Clauses
There is no other research tool quite like this one.
If you want to know if a court has ever considered specific contract wording, you can insert a few key words from the contract as search terms. All cases with similar wording will be included in the search results. You will be provided with excerpts of both the clause text and the court’s discussion of that text.
If you are interested in comparing how the courts have treated different forms of a specific type of contract clause, such as “arbitration” or “follow the fortunes” clauses, you can easily retrieve all the cases in the database discussing that type of clause.

What type of information is included in the database?
When a U.S. case is reported, we identify the primary issues and address those issues in a summary of the ruling. We then assign “preset keywords” or common reinsurance terms that would be most widely recognized as relating to the issues presented. This approach is intended to make searching intuitive.
Our legal staff also determines whether a contract clause is at issue in the case. If so, an excerpt of the clause is provided as well as the court’s discussion of the clause.

How to Search

1. Setting your “Search Type”
   The first step is to set the scope of the search by choosing one of the following “Search Type” buttons:
   • “Search for all selected keywords - this means that the terms are connected with an "and" and will reduce the number of cases you retrieve”: Your search will produce any case whose summary or contract clause excerpt contains all of the keywords that you selected from the list of “preset keywords” and all of the terms you typed in to the “custom keywords” box.
     It is important to understand that choosing the “Search for all selected keywords” search type will reduce the number of cases you retrieve, because no case will be included in the results unless it contains all the keywords you chose.
   • “Search for at least one selected keyword - this is an "or" search and will increase the number of cases you retrieve” Your search will produce any case with a summary or contract clause excerpt that contains any one of the keywords that you selected from the list of “preset keywords” or typed in to the “custom keywords” box.
   • It is important to understand that choosing the “Search for at least one selected keyword” search type will increase the number of cases you retrieve, because any case that contains any one of the selected keywords will be included in the results.
2. Choosing your search terms
   Next, set your search terms using either the “Preset Keywords” or “Custom Keywords” features or both:
   • “Preset Keywords”: Selecting the “Select Preset Keywords” button on the search page produces a pop-up menu with an alphabetized list of common terms that are associated with legal issues regularly found in reinsurance litigations and arbitrations. You may include as many keywords as you wish in your search by clicking on the boxes next to the keywords, then clicking on the “Select” button which appears at both the top and the bottom of the menu.
     After choosing the preset keywords, you may choose to supplement your search terms by also using the “Custom Keywords” feature described below, or you may execute the search by clicking on “Perform Search.”
   • “Custom Keywords”: Typing terms into this box will produce a search for those terms in the database. You may type in as many words as you wish. Separate the terms with spaces; for example, you might wish to search for case summaries and contract clause excerpts involving binding arbitration by typing in the words arbitration and binding, separated by a space. The order of the words does not matter.
     The “Custom Keywords” feature may also be used to search for phrases by enclosing the phrase in quotation marks. For example, typing in the phrase “direct access,” enclosed in quotation marks, would produce database entries which include the phrase “direct access.”
     After typing in your custom keywords, you may choose to supplement your typed-in search terms by also using the “Select Preset Keywords” feature described above, or you may execute the search immediately by clicking on “Perform Search.”
3. Limiting your search by jurisdiction
   • “Select Jurisdiction”: A click on this button will produce a list of federal and state jurisdictions. Checking the box next to a certain jurisdiction limits the results of your search to cases from that jurisdiction, including the U.S. Supreme Court, any United States Circuit Court of Appeals, the state and federal courts of any particular state, or any combination of those jurisdictions. Other courts such as the U.S. Bankruptcy Court are also included. You may choose as many jurisdictions as you wish.
4. Further focusing your results
   • “Search Within”: This feature allows you to execute a broad search, review the results, then narrow your search by searching within those results. To use, delete the original search term(s) that you used in either Preset Keywords or Custom Keywords or both; choose or type in a new search term; then click on “Search Within.”

Displaying or Printing the Full Version of Your Results

• “Print Checked” and “Display Checked”: The results of your search will appear in a list of case citations, each entry with a check-box beside it. You may individually click on a single case name that interests you, or select multiple cases by clicking the check boxes then choosing “Print Checked” or “Display Checked.” The full-text database entry of the case(s) that you chose will open up in a separate pop-up box.
• If you clicked “Print Checked” the cases that you chose will be displayed vertically in a printer friendly window with a “Print” link to print all of the cases in paginated form.
• If you clicked “Display Checked” the cases will appear in the window one at a time with controls that allow you to go forward or back in the list of cases. The “Print” link in this case will only print the case that is currently displayed.
• If you wish to print or to display all the cases that resulted from your search, you may choose the “Check All” function at the top of the case citation list – and the “Uncheck All” function if you change your mind.

Comparing Contract Clause Wordings

• First, choose “Contract Clauses” from the menu at the top of the screen.
• A pop-up box will appear that contains an alphabetized list of all the types of contract clauses that exist in the database, such as “Arbitration” or “Commutation” clauses. Check the type(s) of clause(s) that interest you, then click the “Select” button that appears at both the top and the bottom of the pop-up box. Click “Perform Search” to execute the search.
• The results on the screen will be examples of different wordings of the type of clause(s) that you chose. For example, if you chose the clause type “Arbitration” you will see dozens of examples of differently-worded arbitration clauses. Each distinct wording has been assigned a “Clause Title,” for example “Arbitration 01,” “Arbitration 02,” etc.
• For each “Clause Title,” you will see an example of particular wording excerpted from a case. Next to this example wording is a list of cases that contain wording substantially similar to the example wording. Click the checkbox next to any case(s) for which you wish to see the case summary and the contract clause excerpts. If you wish to view the text on the screen, choose “Display Checked.” If you wish to print out the full text, choose “Print Checked.”

Using “My Account”
You may wish to visit the “My Account” screen, where you can choose a default of showing or hiding the “Contract Clause Language” feature or the “Caselaw Summary” feature, or choose to leave them both showing. We suggest that you leave them both showing until you are familiar with database features.

You can also change your email address and password on this screen.