Glossary

ADA Amendments Act (ADAAA) of 2008 redefines who is considered "disabled" under the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) that includes a larger population of employees considered disabled. The ADAAA made major revisions to the following technical aspects of the ADA, by (1) redefining the term "substantially limits," (2) enumerating and expanding the term "major life activities" to include "major bodily functions," (3) eliminating mitigating measures from consideration, (4) expanding the scope of "regarded as" claims and specifying that no accommodation is required for "regarded as" disabilities, and (5) adding various employer-friendly provisions. The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) implemented regulations to reflect these changes. The ADAAA also mandates that the EEOC issue new regulations and guidance. The regulations must be consistent with the broader scope intended by the ADAAA and provide a new regulatory definition of "substantially limits" that lowers the standard for finding an employee to be disabled.

An add-on control device is an air pollution control device, such as carbon absorber or incinerator, that reduces the level of pollutants in an exhaust gas. The control device usually does not affect the process being controlled and thus is "add-on" technology, as opposed to a scheme to control pollution effected by altering the basic process itself.

Add-on no-fault laws are statutes applicable in some states that allow the addition of personal injury protection (PIP) coverages to auto insurance policies without limiting an injured party's right to sue in tort. In some of these "add-on" states, purchase of these personal injury (PI), or "no-fault," coverages is mandatory. In others, purchase is at the insured's option, although insurers are required to offer them.

Additional deposit privilege refers to a provision found in some universal life insurance policies that allows the policyholder to make unscheduled premium payments at any time prior to the policy's maturity date.

An additional insured is a person or organization not automatically included as an insured under an insurance policy who is included or added as an insured under the policy at the request of the named insured. A named insured's impetus for providing additional insured status to others may be a desire to protect the other party because of a close relationship with that party (e.g., wanting to protect church members performing services for the insured church) or to comply with a contractual agreement requiring the named insured to do so (e.g., project owners, customers, or owners of property leased by the named insured). In liability insurance, additional insured status is commonly used in conjunction with an indemnity agreement between the named insured (the indemnitor) and the party requesting additional insured status (the indemnitee). Having the rights of an insured under its indemnitor's commercial general liability (CGL) policy is viewed by most indemnitees as a way of backing up the promise of indemnification. If the indemnity agreement proves unenforceable for some reason, the indemnitee may still be able to obtain coverage for its liability by making a claim directly as an additional insured under the indemnitor's CGL policy. In property insurance, additional insured status is most often used in conjunction with a premises lease agreement between the named insured as the lessee and the owner of the leased building, in which the insured tenant is required to purchase insurance on the leased building and name the building owner as an additional insured on the insurance policy with respect to the leased building.

An additional insured endorsement is a policy endorsement used to add coverage for additional insureds by name—for example, mortgageholders or lessors. There are a number of different forms intended to address various situations, some of which afford very restrictive coverage to additional insureds. (Rather than naming each additional insured, a blanket additional insured endorsement sometimes is available.)

Additional living expense (ALE) is a type of insurance included within homeowners policies. ALE coverage reimburses the insured for the cost of maintaining a comparable standard of living following a covered loss that exceeds the insured's normal expenses prior to the loss. For example, ALE insurance would cover an insured's motel bill while fire damage to the home is being repaired or replaced or until the insured moves to a permanent residence. ALE coverage is subject to a limit equal to 30 percent of the dwelling limit under forms homeowners (HO) 2, HO 3, and HO 5. For form HO 8, ALE is 10 percent of the dwelling limit. Under the tenants policy (HO 4), ALE is 30 percent of the personal property limit, while under the condominium unit owners policy (HO 6), the limit of ALE is 50 percent of the personal property limit.

Additional medical provides medical benefits to an insured worker over and above those provided by the statutory compensation laws of a particular state. Most state regulations provide for unlimited medical coverage for injured workers; however, in the few states where a limit remains in place, the workers compensation administrator may grant a variance to override the limit.

An additional named insured is a person or organization, other than the first named insured, identified as an insured in the policy declarations or an addendum to the policy declarations. It is also person or organization added to a policy after the policy is written with the status of named insured. This entity would have the same rights and responsibilities as an entity named as an insured in the policy declarations (other than those rights and responsibilities reserved to the first named insured). In this sense, the term can be contrasted with additional insured, a person or organization added to a policy as an insured but not as a named insured. The term has not acquired a uniformly agreed upon meaning within the insurance industry, and use of the term in the two different senses defined above often produces confusion in requests for additional insured status between contracting parties.

The additional term insurance option is available under participating life insurance policies where the policyholder can request the insurance company to use a policy dividend as a net single premium to purchase a 1-year term life insurance policy on the policyholder's life. This is also known as a fifth dividend option. There are other ways to add term insurance to a permanent insurance policy, usually by adding riders for additional term coverage.