House Civil Law committee advances package of bills on insurance, medical-billing and comparative fault

The House Civil Law and Procedure Committee on Tuesday advanced a set of bills intended to change how courts and insurers handle personal‑injury claims, medical billing and fault allocation.

Committee members sent six bills to the House floor after debate ranging from brief procedural explanations to longer policy arguments and public testimony from insurance agents, business owners and state regulators.

Why it matters: Committee supporters said the measures are intended to reduce insurance costs by limiting inflated claims, improving pre‑suit transparency and aligning Louisiana with other states’ rules on fault and recoverable medical expenses. Opponents cautioned that some measures could unfairly limit recovery for injured people and noted the need to protect procedural fairness.

What the committee did

- Representative Gallet introduced House Bill 2 91, which the author described as a “cleanup bill” to maintain the two‑year prescriptive period for certain causes of action. The committee cleared the bill by unanimous consent and sent it to the floor.

- Representative DeWitt’s House Bill 4 34 would raise recovery thresholds for uninsured motorists, changing minimum recoverable limits for bodily injury and property damage. DeWitt told the committee the bill raises the bodily‑injury recovery threshold to $100,000 (from $15,000) and property‑damage recovery to $100,000 (from $25,000); technical amendments were…