Disputes over the extent of consumers’ ability to stack underinsured and uninsured motorist insurance coverage keep popping up in Pennsylvania—and courts keep siding with the insureds.

In a Sept. 16 decision in Rutt v. Donegal Mutual Insurance, a Lancaster County Court of Common Pleas judge ruled that the Pennsylvania Supreme Court’s landmark January ruling in Gallagher v. Geico, which held that the household vehicle exclusion in insurance policies violates the Pennsylvania Motor Vehicle Financial Responsibility Law and cannot be used to bar stacked coverage, applied to all household vehicle exclusions and should be applied retroactively. The court rejected the defendant insurer’s argument that Gallagher was only applicable to situations where both policies were issued by the same insurance provider and that it should only apply prospectively because it introduced a new rule of law.