Maryland total-loss rules

The quoted text is the opening of the definition as retrieved; the definition continues with an alternative limb keyed to a percentage of actual cash value established by the insurer, and with estimated hidden damage and rental coverage counted into the repair side. That continuation is recorded from a secondary source rather than retrieved verbatim. Unlike most states in this ledger the definition sits in the INSURANCE regulation rather than the vehicle code, which is why it bears on settlement rather than only on titling.

Note the word MINIMUM: .04 sets a floor on the offer, not a formula for it. The database must produce 'statistically valid' values, which is a standard a valuation report can be measured against rather than a description of what one usually contains.

The 4,000-mile-or-10-per-cent test matches New York's, but Maryland adds a rule New York does not have: a comparable may not be an OLDER model year than the damaged vehicle. An older-year comparable is therefore disqualified on the face of the regulation, which is one of the cleanest checkable points in the ledger. Maryland sets no distance limit for the manual or database route; the dealer-quotation route requires only a location reasonably convenient to the claimant.

The strongest disclosure package in the ledger. Three things arrive without asking — the calculation, the deductions, and the fact that you may counteroffer — and a documentation request carries its own 7-business-day clock. Deductions provision, verbatim: 'A list of all deductions that will be made from the value of the motor vehicle'. If a Maryland offer arrived without these, that is a self-contained regulatory point requiring no argument about value.

The salvage carve-out here runs the OPPOSITE way to North Carolina's. North Carolina removes tax and registration fees when the claimant retains the salvage; Maryland expressly preserves them. A Maryland claimant keeping the car should still be paid tax and transfer fees, and the regulation says so in terms.

Maryland points at a specific fee schedule (COMAR 11.11.05, a Motor Vehicle Administration chapter) rather than leaving 'fees' undefined, so the amount owed is determinable rather than arguable. That chapter was not read directly.

Recorded as partial because the FIELD is about a policy appraisal provision, and COMAR 31.15.12 contains none — sections .02 to .06 were retrieved and none mentions appraisal or an umpire. What Maryland has instead is better suited to a documented counteroffer: the permitted sources are broad (dealer quotations, advertisements, or any other source of valuation), and a rejection obliges the insurer to explain in writing, within 5 business days, why your evidence does not produce a more accurate valuation than theirs. That is a regulator-enforceable answer in writing, which is what a complaint is later built on.

Note the mix of day types, which is easy to get wrong: the first-party offer clock runs in BUSINESS days while the third-party clock at §D is expressed in plain days. The 10-business-day clock starts from the insurer's own determination of total loss rather than from notice of the claim, so the date the adjuster called it a total loss is the date worth pinning down in writing. Maryland allows exceptions for a good faith dispute and for circumstances beyond the insurer's control.

Quoted provision is § 27-303(6). The section opens 'It is an unfair claim settlement practice and a violation of this subtitle for an insurer' and, as retrieved, carries NO general-business-practice frequency qualifier — so a single mishandled claim can be measured against it, unlike Arizona, Pennsylvania or Virginia. § 27-303(9) additionally requires an insurer to act in good faith as defined under § 27-1001, which was not retrieved here.

THREE years — among the shortest in the ledger, alongside North Carolina and Colorado, and half of Pennsylvania's. Maryland's generous claim-handling rules should not be mistaken for a generous limitation period. Check the policy for a shorter suit-limitation clause as well.

Complaints are filed through the Administration's enterprise consumer portal at the address above, which is separate from its informational site.

A standalone insurance regulator, unlike Minnesota's Department of Commerce or New Jersey's combined banking and insurance department.