Mississippi: In Bad Faith Case, Evidence of Insurer’s Actions Prior to Exhaustion of Administrative Remedies Was Admissible

A Mississippi appellate court held that the requirement that an employee exhaust his or her administrative remedies before filing a lawsuit for bad faith refusal to pay for disputed medical services and supplies merely ensured that the state’s Workers’ Compensation Commission had determined whether the claimed medical expenses were reasonable and necessary. Such a requirement did not, however, mean that an insurer’s conduct prior to the exhaustion of administrative remedies could not form the basis of a bad-faith lawsuit. It was error to exclude all evidence of the employer’s and insurance carrier’s actions before the employee exhausted her administrative remedies and the case against the insurer was reversed and remanded.

Thomas A. Robinson, J.D., the Feature National Columnist for the LexisNexis Workers’ Compensation eNewsletter, is the co-author of Larson’s Workers’ Compensation Law (LexisNexis).

LexisNexis Online Subscribers: Citations below link to Lexis

See Walls v. Franklin Corp., 2015 Miss. App. LEXIS 243 (May 5, 2015) [

See generally Larson’s Workers’ Compensation Law, § 104.05 

Source: Larson’s Workers’ Compensation Law, the nation’s leading authority on workers’ compensation law.

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