On December 31, 1994, John Willison was a passenger in a friend's car and sustained injuries in a collision. He was living with his parents at the time, and he recovered $75,000 from the company which had insured the driver. His parents had two policies issued by Economy, one of which was a business policy and the other a personal policy--both of which provided for underinsured motorist benefits. He later was paid $25,000 under the UIM provisions of the business policy.

He then filed claim for UIM benefits under his parents' personal policy, and the claim was refused since the total limits of the business policy and the personal policy was $100,000 for each person. Economy contended that since John was an insured under the policies, the "Other Insurance" provisions of the policies precluded recovery. John insisted that the general conditions of the policy applied since the two policies were issued by Economy, whereas the "Other Insurance" coverage applied only to policies issued by different companies.

The trial court entered summary judgment in favor of Economy and John appealed.

The appeals court ruled that the anti-stacking clause contained in the UIM provisions of the personal policy applied to both UIM stacking under one policy and UIM stacking under multiple policies issued by the same--or different--companies. John was an insured and could not stack UIM benefits in excess of the applicable policy limits.

The judgment entered in the trial court for Economy was affirmed.

John G. Willison, Appellant, v. Economy Fire & Casualty Company--No. 4-97-0462--Appellate Court of Illinois, Fourth District--February 9, 1998--690 North Eastern Reporter 2d 1073.