“Whenever Made” Means What It Says: Broad Related-Claims Clauses Treat Later Suits as One Claim First Made in the Earliest Policy Period

Case: Navigators Specialty Insurance Company v. Avertest, LLC
Court: United States Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit (unpublished)
Date: June 9, 2026
Disposition: Vacated and remanded

1. Introduction

This appeal resolves a coverage-allocation fight between two insurers—Columbia Casualty Company (“Columbia”) and Navigators Specialty Insurance Company (“Navigators”)—over which carrier must defend and (potentially) indemnify their mutual insured, Avertest, LLC (“Avertest”), a laboratory conducting drug testing of biological samples.

The central question was contractual and timing-based: when a later lawsuit is filed after an insured changes claims-made insurers, does a broad “related claims” provision in the earlier policy pull the later suit back into the earlier policy period?

Two lawsuits drove the dispute:

• Gonzalez v. Avertest, LLC (filed February 2021, during Columbia’s policy): alleged Avertest reported false positives because it prioritized speed over compliance with CAP standards, including specific failures involving quality controls, internal standards, and calibration curves.
• Foulger v. Avertest, LLC (filed August 2022, shortly after the switch to Navigators): brought by different plaintiffs but pleaded the same core CAP-standards departures—using substantially identical language—and alleged similar resulting harms in child custody proceedings.

Navigators initially defended under a reservation of rights, then sought a declaration that Columbia must defend because Foulger was “related” to Gonzalez. The district court held the suits were not related. The Fourth Circuit disagreed and vacated.

2. Summary of the Opinion

Applying Virginia contract/insurance principles, the Fourth Circuit held that Gonzalez and Foulger are “related claims” under Columbia’s professional liability policy because both arise from the same alleged testing-methodology failures (quality controls, internal standards, calibration curves) tied to the same alleged “scheme” (prioritizing speed over CAP compliance) producing the same type of alleged error (false positives) and similar harms (adverse child-custody consequences).

The court emphasized that the policy’s related-claims clause treats “[a]ll related claims, whenever made” as “a single claim first made” in the policy period of the earliest related claim. Because Gonzalez was first made during Columbia’s 2020–2021 policy period, Foulger is deemed first made then as well—making Columbia responsible for the Foulger defense and reimbursement to Navigators.

3. Analysis

3.1 Precedents Cited

• DENC, LLC v. Phila. Indemn. Ins. Co., 32 F.4th 38 (4th Cir. 2022)
  Role in the opinion: Provided the de novo standard of review for cross-motions for summary judgment and reiterated the Rule 56 framing. It set the appellate posture but did not drive the interpretive holding.
• Towers Watson & Co. v. Nat. Union Fire Ins. Co. of Pittsburgh, 67 F.4th 648 (4th Cir. 2023)
  Role in the opinion: Supplied the governing Virginia-law principle that insurance policies are contracts interpreted by their ordinary and customary meaning, with ambiguity construed against the drafter (typically the insurer). The court used this as the baseline for interpreting “related claims.”
• Erie Ins. Exch. v. EPC MD 15, LLC, 822 S.E.2d 351 (Va. 2019)
  Role in the opinion: Sharpened the ambiguity analysis. The Fourth Circuit relied on Erie’s warning not to “give up quickly” by declaring ambiguity from isolated dictionary meanings, and Erie’s requirement that competing interpretations must be “equally possible” in context. This supported the court’s insistence on enforcing the “whenever made” text as written.
• Tederick v. LoanCare, LLC, 168 F.4th 154 (4th Cir. 2026)
  Role in the opinion: Restated the Erie doctrine in federal diversity cases: apply settled state law and predict how the state’s highest court would rule on unsettled questions. This grounded the court’s approach to applying Virginia principles to a related-claims dispute.
• Navigators Ins. Co. v. Under Armour, Inc., 165 F.4th 171 (4th Cir. 2026)
  Role in the opinion: This was the key interpretive comparator. Under Armour construed similar “logically or causally related” language, defining “logically related” as “reasonably or rationally connected to or associated with one another,” and finding relatedness where claims were “part of the same scheme.” The court imported that conceptual lens here: both lawsuits alleged a common testing-methodology scheme producing false positives.
• W.C. & A.N. Miller Dev. Co. v. Continental Cas. Co., 814 F.3d 171 (4th Cir. 2016)
  Role in the opinion: Reinforced that “logically or causally connected by reason of any common fact” language is “expansive,” and that a “common nexus of fact” can be enough (including a “but for” relationship). The court relied on Miller to reject an overly granular, claim-by-claim or plaintiff-by-plaintiff approach and to validate broad aggregation when the policy text supports it.

3.2 Legal Reasoning

(a) The operative contract language was deliberately broad.

Columbia’s policy defined “related claims” as claims arising out of related acts, errors, or omissions—where “related” means “logically or causally connected by any common fact, circumstance, situation, transaction, event, advice or decision.” The court treated “any common” as an intentional breadth signal, consistent with W.C. & A.N. Miller Dev. Co. v. Continental Cas. Co..

(b) The court focused on the alleged operative conduct—not superficial differences between suits.

The district court acknowledged similarities but held the suits were not related due to “substantial differences” (different plaintiffs, different tests, additional collection allegations, etc.). The Fourth Circuit held that framing misapprehended the policy’s test. The clause did not require that the two cases be “the same” or even predominantly similar; it required logical/causal connection via any common fact/circumstance/event/advice/decision.

On the pleadings, both complaints alleged the same core testing-method failures (quality controls, internal standards, calibration curves) and the same overarching business practice (prioritizing speed over CAP standards), leading to false positives and similar custody-related harms. That common alleged methodology was more than a “nexus”; it was “the very same errors in testing methodology.”

(c) “Whenever made” prevented Columbia from re-imposing the claims-made timing requirement claim-by-claim.

Columbia argued its claims-made policy could not cover Foulger because Foulger was not made and reported during its policy period. The court rejected this as a bid to rewrite the contract by effectively deleting “whenever made” from the related-claims provision.

The court’s reasoning is structural: the related-claims clause is itself a timing mechanism that deems all related claims—regardless of when asserted—to be a single claim “first made” in the earliest claim’s policy period. Thus, if Gonzalez was properly made and reported during Columbia’s policy, then a later related claim is contractually treated as having been made then as well.

(d) Successive-policy allocation followed from the Columbia policy plus Navigators’ exclusion.

The opinion notes that Navigators’ policy included Exclusion Y, excluding any claim “covered under[] another program of insurance prior to this policy.” Once the court concluded Columbia’s policy covered Foulger as part of the earlier single related claim, Navigators was not the defending carrier (and Columbia owed reimbursement).

3.3 Impact

• Reinforces broad aggregation under “logical or causal connection” language.
  The decision underscores that, in the Fourth Circuit applying Virginia law, “related claims” clauses drafted with “any common fact/circumstance” and “whenever made” will be enforced expansively—especially when later pleadings repeat the same alleged wrongful methodology.
• Stabilizes successor-insurer disputes in claims-made transitions.
  When an insured changes claims-made carriers, related-claims clauses can shift defense obligations backward to the earlier insurer. This opinion signals courts will not allow a carrier to use general claims-made timing language to negate the specific deeming function of a “whenever made” related-claims provision.
• Encourages careful renewal diligence and policy drafting.
  Insureds and brokers should scrutinize prior-acts/related-claims provisions and ensure consistent reporting practices. Insurers who want a narrower tie-back must draft it explicitly (e.g., limiting related-claims deeming to claims reported within a specified window), rather than relying on generalized “claims first made and reported” concepts.
• Practical pleading consequence: repeated factual “templates” can drive coverage outcomes.
  The court relied heavily on the fact that Foulger repeated, “word for word,” key allegations from Gonzalez. Plaintiffs’ counsel reusing detailed methodological allegations can inadvertently determine which policy year (and which insurer) is on the risk.

4. Complex Concepts Simplified

• Claims-made policy: Coverage is typically triggered when a claim is first made (and often reported) during the policy period, rather than when the underlying conduct occurred.
• Related-claims provision (“tie-back”): A clause that groups multiple claims into a single claim if they share specified connections. Here, the clause treated all related claims “whenever made” as one claim first made when the earliest related claim was made.
• “Logically or causally connected by any common fact…”: Very broad language. It does not require identical parties or identical transactions; one meaningful common connecting feature can suffice if the connection is rational.
• Duty to defend vs. duty to indemnify: Defense is the obligation to provide/pay for lawyers and litigation costs; indemnity is the obligation to pay settlements or judgments. This appeal focused on which insurer must defend (and reimburse defense costs).
• Reservation of rights: An insurer may defend while preserving its ability to later deny coverage based on policy defenses—what Navigators initially did.

5. Conclusion

The Fourth Circuit vacated the district court and held that Gonzalez and Foulger are “related claims” under Columbia’s policy because both alleged the same core testing-methodology failures and the same prioritization-of-speed “scheme,” making them logically connected by common facts and circumstances. Critically, the court enforced the clause deeming related claims—“whenever made”—to be a single claim first made in the earliest policy period, rejecting Columbia’s attempt to reintroduce a claim-by-claim timing bar.

The decision’s broader significance is its straightforward enforcement of expansive related-claims language in a claims-made setting: when the contract says later related suits are treated as one earlier-made claim, courts will apply that deeming rule as written—reshaping defense responsibility across successive insurers.