Case information

Insurance — Automobile accident — Settlement — Disclosure — Signature — Regulation setting out requirements applicable to mandatory insurance settlement disclosure document — Insured person entering into settlement with insurer following arbitration — Insured person initialling each page of disclosure document after conclusion of arbitration but not signing acknowledgement line — When are mandatory insurance documents rendered unenforceable for technical deficiencies — Whether five-judge panel should overturn “bright-line” test applicable to assessing compliance with requirements applicable to mandatory insurance documents.

Case summaries are prepared by the Office of the Registrar of the Supreme Court of Canada (Law Branch). Please note that summaries are not provided to the Judges of the Court. They are placed on the Court file and website for information purposes only.

Thanh Ho sought benefits after being involved in an automobile accident in 2000. Disputes arose between Mr. Ho and the insurer, Allstate, regarding his entitlement to certain benefits. In 2002, Mr. Ho applied for arbitration before the Financial Services Commission of Ontario (“FSCO”). Following a settlement discussion with an arbitrator, the parties settled the matter on May 17, 2004, and various documents — including the settlement disclosure notice (“SDN”) — were completed. Mr. Ho was not directed to sign the acknowledgement in that document, but each page of the SDN was initialled by Mr. Ho and signed by a witness. In February 2005, the FSCO advised Mr. Ho that it would close his file as the matter had been settled in May 2004.

In 2019, Mr. Ho notified Allstate and the FSCO that he wished to reopen the arbitration hearing, thereby rescinding the 2004 settlement. In 2020, the FSCO ordered that Mr. Ho was precluded from proceeding to arbitration because his application has been extinguished. On November 28, 2020, Mr. Ho filed an application for a determination of this matter with the Licence Appeal Tribunal. Mr. Ho argued that because he had not signed the acknowledgement in the SDN, the SDN did not comply with the requirements set out in s. 9.1 of Automobile Insurance, R.R.O. 1990, Reg. 664, with respect to settlements; consequently, he argued that the two-day rescission period set out in that provision did not apply, allowing him to rescind the settlement beyond the expiry of that period. The Licence Appeal Tribunal dismissed Mr. Ho’s application and, subsequently, his request for reconsideration of its first decision. It concluded that the SDN complied with the requirements of s. 9.1 and that Mr. Ho was bound by the 2004 settlement as he did not rescind it within the two-day rescission period provided for in s. 9.1. The Divisional Court dismissed Mr. Ho’s appeal and application for judicial review of the Licence Appeal Tribunal’s two decisions, and the Court of Appeal for Ontario dismissed his motion for leave to appeal the Divisional Court’s decision.

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