FMC Corp. v. Holliday

• Decision Date: 05 October 1989
• Docket Number: No. 89-3226,89-3226
• Parties: , 11 Employee Benefits Ca 1777 FMC CORPORATION, Appellant, v. Cynthia Ann HOLLIDAY, Appellee.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Third Circuit

Page 79

885 F.2d 79

58 USLW 2183, 11 Employee Benefits Ca 1777

FMC CORPORATION, Appellant, v. Cynthia Ann HOLLIDAY, Appellee.

No. 89-3226.

United States Court of Appeals, Third Circuit.

Argued July 25, 1989.

Decided Sept. 11, 1989.

Rehearing and Rehearing In Banc Denied Oct. 5, 1989.

Charles Kelly [argued], H. Woodruff Turner, Stephen M. Rosenblatt, Kirkpatrick and Lockhart, Pittsburgh, Pa., for appellant.

Thomas G. Johnson [argued], Malcolm & Johnson, Indiana, Pa., for appellee.

Before GIBBONS, Chief Judge, HUTCHINSON, Circuit Judge and WOLIN, District Judge ^*.

OPINION OF THE COURT

GIBBONS, Chief Judge:

FMC Corporation appeals from a summary judgment in favor of the defendant Cynthia Ann Holliday, in FMC's action seeking a declaratory judgment that it is entitled to subrogation against Ms. Holliday's recovery for personal injuries received in an automobile accident. FMC is an employer operating a health plan and employs Ms. Holliday's father. She was permanently injured, and FMC has paid and will in the future pay her medical expenses pursuant to that plan. The district court held that under Pennsylvania law FMC had no subrogation rights, and that Pennsylvania law was not preempted by section 514 of the Employee Retirement Income Security Act of 1974 (ERISA), 29 U.S.C. Sec. 1144. FMC contends the district court erred in both respects. We will affirm.

I.

On January 16, 1987, Ms. Holliday, then age 15, was seriously and permanently injured while riding as an automobile passenger in Indiana County, Pennsylvania. Her medical expenses to date exceed $178,000 and the cost of future care is unknown. At the time of the accident her father owned an automobile policy issued by State Farm Mutual Automobile Insurance Company, which paid the first $10,000 of his daughter's medical bills. Mr. Holliday also commenced a negligence action on behalf of his daughter in the Court of Common Pleas of Indiana County against Robert Lyons, the driver of the car in which she was a passenger at the time of the accident. That case proceeded to an eventual settlement on September 3, 1987, under which Lyons interpleaded his $100,000 automobile liability policy in favor of Ms. Holliday and three other claimants injured in the accident. Ms. Holliday's recovery was limited to $49,875.50 plus accrued interest.

At the time of the accident Mr. Holliday was also a covered employee under FMC's Salaried Health Plan, which provided benefits for dependents. That plan contains coordination of benefits clauses as follow:

If you or a covered member of your family are eligible to receive benefits under another group medical plan, Health Maintenance Organization (HMO), government plan, or by "no-fault" automobile insurance which provides medical coverage, you may be eligible for benefits from those Plans and your FMC plan. In the case of coverage by "no-fault" automobile insurance, FMC will pay covered expenses not paid for by no-fault insurance.

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No-Fault In some states with no-fault motor vehicle coverage, the carrier is the primary insurer in these jurisdictions. All medical expenses related to an accident must be submitted to the carrier and not the FMC Health Care Plan. Eligible expenses not paid for by no-fault insurance will be paid by the FMC Plan.

Relying on these clauses FMC commenced paying Ms. Holliday's medical expenses only when the $10,000 no-fault coverage under her father's State Farm automobile policy was exhausted. That $10,000 is not in dispute.

The FMC Salaried Health Plan also contains a subrogation clause as follows:

The FMC self insured benefit program is automatically assigned the right of action against third parties in any situation in which benefits are paid to employees or their dependents. If you bring a liability claim against any third party, benefits payable under this Plan must be included in the claim, and when the claim is settled you must reimburse the Plan for the benefits provided. You are obligated to avoid doing anything which would prejudice the Plan's rights of reimbursement, and you are required to sign and deliver documents to evidence or secure those rights. Unless you sign the Company's "third party reimbursement form," the Claims Administrator will not process any claim where there is possible liability on behalf of a third party.

(emphasis supplied). In order to obtain reimbursement of medical expenses in excess of $10,000, Mr. Holliday signed a third-party reimbursement form, and the Salaried Health Plan thereafter paid his daughter's medical expenses.

When FMC learned of the negligence action in Indiana County it notified the Hollidays that it intended to exercise its subrogation rights with respect to that liability claim. The Hollidays responded that 75 Pa. Cons. Stat.Ann. Sec. 1720 of the Pennsylvania Motor Vehicle Law prohibits such subrogation. This declaratory judgment action followed.

II.

FMC contends that the court erred in holding that the exercise of its subrogation rights is barred by the relevant Pennsylvania law. The governing statute is the Pennsylvania Motor Vehicle Financial Responsibility Law, Act of Feb. 12, 1984, No. 11, Sec. 3, 1984 Pa.Laws 28, as amended by Act of Feb. 12, 1984, No. 12, Sec. 3, 1984 Pa.Laws 53, 75 Pa.Cons.Stat.Ann. Secs. 1701-1798 (Purdon 1988), which is a comprehensive effort to establish a uniform system for the prompt payment of economic losses suffered by victims of vehicular collisions, including coverage for medical expenses arising out of the maintenance or use of a motor vehicle. See Pennsylvania Legislative Journal, 167th Sess., Oct. 4, 1983, at 1147 (comments of Sen. Holl); id., 167th Sess., Dec. 14, 1983, at 2241 (comments of Rep. Manderino). Two provisions of the Motor Vehicle Law bear directly on this case: section 1720, which bars the assertion of subrogation rights; and section 1719, which helps define the scope of section 1720.

Section 1720 precludes subrogation with reference to a broad range of insurance arrangements:

In actions arising out of the maintenance or use of a motor vehicle, there shall be no right of subrogation or reimbursement from a claimant's tort recovery with respect to workers' compensation benefits, benefits available under section 1711 (relating to required benefits), 1712 (relating to availability of benefits) or 1715 (relating to availability of adequate limits) or benefits in lieu thereof paid or payable under section 1719 (relation to coordination of benefits).

75 Pa.Cons.Stat.Ann. Sec. 1720 (emphasis added). The coordination of benefits provision reads:

(a) General rule.--Except for workers' compensation, a policy of insurance issued or delivered pursuant to this subchapter shall be primary. Any program, group contract or other arrangement for payment of benefits such as described in section 1711 (relating to required benefits) 1712(1) and (2) (relating to availability (b) Definition.--As used in this section the term "program, group contract or other arrangement" includes, but is not limited to, benefits payable by a hospital plan corporation or a professional health service corporation subject to 40 Pa.C.S. Ch. 61 (relating to hospital plan corporations) or 63 (relating to professional health services plan corporations).

of benefits) or 1715 (relating to availability of adequate limits) shall be construed to contain a provision that all benefits provided therein shall be in excess of and not in duplication of any valid and collectible first party benefits provided in section 1711, 1712 or 1715 or workers' compensation.

75 Pa.Cons.Stat.Ann. Sec. 1719 (emphasis added).

The FMC Salaried Health Plan clearly falls within the plain meaning of section 1719. First, the Motor Vehicle Law elsewhere defines the term "benefits" to include "medical benefits". 75 Pa.Cons.Stat.Ann. Sec. 1702. Second, section 1719(b) expressly employs non-exclusive language in defining the types of programs the statute covers. Finally, FMC effectively availed itself of section 1719's coordination of benefits formula in the Salaried Health Plan's parallel clauses quoted above. FMC's counterarguments are without merit. In a reading anything but plain, the corporation contends that the use in section 1719 of the phrase "group contract," an insurance term of art, indicates a clear intent to regulate only entities whose primary purpose is providing insurance or health care services. In itself a questionable interpretation of the term "group contract," FMC's argument ignores section 1719's use of two other patently non-exclusive terms, namely, "program" and "other arrangement." ERISA uses the terms "plan, fund or program" to define ERISA plans, 29 U.S.C. Sec. 1002(1); the phrase "other arrangements" could scarcely be more broad on its face.

Pointing to the fact that subrogation is a long-established principle in Pennsylvania law, FMC urges that the Financial Responsibility law should be presumed not to have made any change in that principle unless the legislature was more specific. That position, however, is inconsistent with Pennsylvania's statute on statutory interpretation providing, at least since 1937, that statutes in derogation of the common law in general "be liberally construed to effect their objects and promote justice." 1 Pa.Cons.Stat.Ann. Sec. 1928(c) (Purdon 1989). ¹ FMC's reliance on Commonwealth v. Miller, 469 Pa. 24, 364 A.2d 886, 887 (1987), moreover, is unavailing since that case deals with criminal statutes, which as a class are among the exceptions to be strictly construed. It is well settled that insurance statutes, in contrast, fall into the primary class and are meant for liberal interpretation. Antanovich v. Allstate Ins. Co., 320 Pa.Super. 322, 327, 467 A.2d 345, 348 (1983), aff'd, 507 Pa. 68, 488 A.2d 571 (1985); Miller v. United States Fidelity & Guar. Co., 304 Pa.Super. 43, 54, 450 A.2d 91, 97 (1982), aff'd, 503 Pa. 127, 468 A.2d 1097 (1983).

FMC's alternative argument from statutory...