Florida Subscriber

We believe that the loss is excluded. Exclusion B.1.g.(3) excludes “water that backs up or overflows from a sewer, drain or sump.” Words or terms in insurance contracts are to be given their common everyday meanings. Webster's Collegiate Dictionary defines “sewer” as “an artificial usu. subterranean conduit to carry off sewage and sometimes surface water.” The definition in Random House International Dictionary is the same. The definition of “septic tank” is “a tank in which the solid matter of continuously flowing sewage is disintegrated by bacteria.” Therefore, a sewer is simply the conduit to reach either a tank or a public sewer system.

Checking Black's Law Dictionary yielded no definitions for either “sewer” or “septic,” so there are no differing definitions used in the courts. In the case of State of Maine et al. v. Manchester Heights Condominiums Associates v. Inhabitants of the Town of Manchester, 389 A.2d 844 (Maine 1978), the court was asked to rule on liability for the failure of one party to run a public sewer line to condominiums that were linked to a septic system, and used “sewer” to describe both connections.

Therefore, the exclusion appears in common, everyday language. There is no “term of art” that needs a different interpretation. You are correct in denying the claim.