Louisiana total-loss rules

Louisiana names the valuation source in the definition itself — the NADA Handbook — which is unusual and makes the denominator checkable rather than a matter of the insurer's own figure. 'Salvage title' is separately defined at § 32:702(13) as the certificate evidencing a total loss declaration; the percentage lives only in the total-loss definition at (14). Titling rule, though Louisiana's insurance statute supplies its own settlement standards — see “how the settlement must be valued”.

Louisiana is one of the few states in this ledger to put the total-loss valuation method in the same statute as the prompt-payment penalty, which means a valuation argument and a delay argument rest on one instrument. The express right of the insured to present their own valuation is rare and directly useful — most states leave that to the policy's dispute machinery if it exists at all.

The undefined 'local market area' puts Louisiana with California, Tennessee and Minnesota — no distance a comparable can be said to fail. What Louisiana does add is a sequencing requirement: the nearest reasonable market is available only IF there are no dealers locally, so a survey reaching outside the local market while local dealers exist departs from the statute on its face. That is a checkable point even without a radius.

Recorded as an absence after reading § 22:1892 for a disclosure duty. Ask in writing and date the request: in Louisiana the request also starts the clock that matters, because the 30-day payment and written-offer duties run from satisfactory proofs of loss and the penalty at (B)(1)(a) attaches to a failure that is arbitrary, capricious or without probable cause. La. R.S. 22:1973, the separate good-faith statute, was not read directly.

The settlement regulation is silent, and the Louisiana Revised Statutes was searched for a total-loss tax provision; the matches were the title-application statute (R.S. 32:707, where the buyer pays tax on the purchase price) and legislative journals for the 2022 act on an initial payment offer after a total loss, which is the § 22:1892 text already read. Because no state rule requires it, the audit argues the tax on the policy's own value standard, the way it does for Michigan, and labels it that way.

The settlement regulation is silent on fees, and the Louisiana Revised Statutes was searched for a total-loss fee requirement; the matches were the title-application statute (R.S. 32:707, where the buyer pays tax on the purchase price) and legislative journals for the 2022 act on an initial payment offer after a total loss, which is the § 22:1892 text already read. Some policy forms include these fees as a matter of contract, which is a policy question rather than a state requirement.

Recorded as partial because the FIELD concerns a policy appraisal provision and § 22:1892 contains none — the section was read for 'appraisal' and 'umpire' machinery and has neither. What it has instead is the insured's stated ability to put forward their own valuation, which is closer to Maryland's counteroffer route than to an appraisal clause. No verbatim quote is recorded for that right because the source returned it as a summary rather than as statutory text.

Louisiana is the only state in this ledger whose prompt-payment clock carries a penalty of this size on its face. § 22:1892(B)(1)(a), verbatim in relevant part: failure 'shall subject the insurer to a penalty, in addition to the amount of the loss, of fifty percent damages on the amount found to be due ... plus any proven economic damages ... or one thousand dollars, whichever is greater'. The trigger is not mere lateness — the failure must be found arbitrary, capricious or without probable cause — but the size of the exposure is why a dated, documented proof of loss matters more in Louisiana than almost anywhere else.

Unlike Arizona, Pennsylvania, Virginia or South Carolina, there is no general-business-practice frequency qualifier standing between a claimant and this statute — it operates claim by claim, and the remedy runs to the insured rather than only to the regulator. La. R.S. 22:1973 provides a separate good-faith cause of action and was not read directly, so it is cited here without a quote.

Recorded as a description rather than a single number because a bare figure would mislead. Louisiana is often listed as a ten-year state on the strength of the general prescriptive period for contracts, but personal auto policies routinely carry a suit-limitation clause and § 22:868(B) expressly permits one down to 24 months. READ THE POLICY: the operative deadline is probably two years from the inception of the loss, not ten. The ten-year general prescription (La. Civ. Code art. 3499) was not read directly.

The online form requires accepting terms first; have the claim number, adjuster's name and policy number ready, and attach documents after submitting. Consumer hotline 1-800-259-5300. The Department will not decide fault or resolve word-against-word disputes.

The regulator's name as it appears on its own complaint page.