Terms Used In Virginia Code > Title 38.2 > Chapter 1 > Article 2 - Insurance Classified and Defined

• Accident and sickness insurance: means insurance against loss resulting from sickness, or from bodily injury or death by accident or accidental means, or from a combination of any or all of these perils. See Virginia Code 38.2-109
• Account: means an arrangement under a terms-of-service agreement in which a custodian carries, maintains, processes, receives, or stores a digital asset of the user or provides goods or services to the user. See Virginia Code 64.2-116
• Adult: means a person 18 years of age or more. See Virginia Code 1-203
• Affidavit: A written statement of facts confirmed by the oath of the party making it, before a notary or officer having authority to administer oaths.
• Agent: includes an original agent, a coagent, a successor agent, and a person to which an agent's authority is delegated. See Virginia Code 64.2-116
• Amendment: A proposal to alter the text of a pending bill or other measure by striking out some of it, by inserting new language, or both. Before an amendment becomes part of the measure, thelegislature must agree to it.
• Annuities: means all agreements to make periodic payments in specified or calculable sums pursuant to the terms of a contract for a stated period of time or for the life of the person or persons specified in the contract. See Virginia Code 38.2-106
• Annuity: A periodic (usually annual) payment of a fixed sum of money for either the life of the recipient or for a fixed number of years. A series of payments under a contract from an insurance company, a trust company, or an individual. Annuity payments are made at regular intervals over a period of more than one full year.
• annuity: shall be deemed to include "variable annuity" and "modified guaranteed annuity" and shall be deemed to include a contract under which a lump sum cash settlement is an alternative to the option of periodic payments. See Virginia Code 38.2-106
• Answer: The formal written statement by a defendant responding to a civil complaint and setting forth the grounds for defense.
• Appeal: A request made after a trial, asking another court (usually the court of appeals) to decide whether the trial was conducted properly. To make such a request is "to appeal" or "to take an appeal." One who appeals is called the appellant.
• Assets: (1) The property comprising the estate of a deceased person, or (2) the property in a trust account.
• Assignment of rights: means the legal procedure whereby an individual assigns support rights to the Commonwealth on behalf of a dependent child or spouse and dependent child. See Virginia Code 63.2-1900
• Attorney: means the person designated and authorized by subscribers as the attorney-in-fact having authority to obligate them on reciprocal insurance contracts. See Virginia Code 38.2-1201
• Attorney-in-fact: A person who, acting as an agent, is given written authorization by another person to transact business for him (her) out of court.
• Beneficiary: A person who is entitled to receive the benefits or proceeds of a will, trust, insurance policy, retirement plan, annuity, or other contract. ^{Source: OCC}
• Bequest: Property gifted by will.
• Bona fide purchaser: means a purchaser of property for value who has acted in the transaction in good faith. See Virginia Code 64.2-100
• Carries: means engages in the transmission of an electronic communication. See Virginia Code 64.2-116
• Catalog of electronic communications: means information that identifies each person with which a user has had an electronic communication, the time and date of the communication, and the electronic address of the person. See Virginia Code 64.2-116
• City: means an independent incorporated community which became a city as provided by law before noon on July 1, 1971, or which has within defined boundaries a population of 5,000 or more and which has become a city as provided by law. See Virginia Code 1-208
• Codicil: An addition, change, or supplement to a will executed with the same formalities required for the will itself.
• Commission: means the State Corporation Commission. See Virginia Code 38.2-100
• Commissioner: means the Commissioner of the Department, his designee or authorized representative. See Virginia Code 63.2-100
• Common law: The legal system that originated in England and is now in use in the United States. It is based on judicial decisions rather than legislative action.
• Conservator: includes a limited conservator. See Virginia Code 64.2-116
• Contract: A legal written agreement that becomes binding when signed.
• Corporation: A legal entity owned by the holders of shares of stock that have been issued, and that can own, receive, and transfer property, and carry on business in its own name.
• Court: means the circuit court for the county or city having jurisdiction over the fiduciary in matters relating to the content of this article. See Virginia Code 64.2-116
• Court order: means any judgment or order of any court having jurisdiction to order payment of support or an order of a court of comparable jurisdiction of another state ordering payment of a set or determinable amount of support moneys. See Virginia Code 63.2-1900
• Custodian: means a person who carries, maintains, processes, receives, or stores a digital asset of a user. See Virginia Code 64.2-116
• Debt: means the total unpaid support obligation established by court order, administrative process or by the payment of public assistance and owed by a noncustodial parent to either the Commonwealth or to his dependent(s). See Virginia Code 63.2-1900
• Decedent: A deceased person.
• Deed: The legal instrument used to transfer title in real property from one person to another.
• Department: means the State Department of Social Services. See Virginia Code 63.2-100
• Deposition: An oral statement made before an officer authorized by law to administer oaths. Such statements are often taken to examine potential witnesses, to obtain discovery, or to be used later in trial.
• Designated recipient: means a person chosen by a user using an online tool to administer digital assets of the user. See Virginia Code 64.2-116
• Digital asset: means an electronic record in which an individual has a right or interest. See Virginia Code 64.2-116
• Donor: The person who makes a gift.
• Electronic: means relating to technology having electrical, digital, magnetic, wireless, optical, electromagnetic, or similar capabilities. See Virginia Code 64.2-116
• Electronic communication service: means a custodian that provides to a user the ability to send or receive an electronic communication. See Virginia Code 64.2-116
• Electronic means: means service of a required notice by the Department through its secure online child support portal to any person who has agreed to accept service through the portal and has created a user account. See Virginia Code 63.2-1900
• Employee: means any individual receiving income. See Virginia Code 63.2-1900
• Employer: means the source of any income. See Virginia Code 63.2-1900
• Evidence: Information presented in testimony or in documents that is used to persuade the fact finder (judge or jury) to decide the case for one side or the other.
• Executor: A male person named in a will to carry out the decedent
• farm: means any person that obtains at least 51 percent of its annual gross income from agricultural operations and produces the agricultural waste used as feedstock for the waste-to-energy technology, (ii) "agricultural waste" means biomass waste materials capable of decomposition that are produced from the raising of plants and animals during agricultural operations, including animal manures, bedding, plant stalks, hulls, and vegetable matter, and (iii) "waste-to-energy technology" means any technology, including but not limited to a methane digester, that converts agricultural waste into gas, steam, or heat that is used to generate electricity on-site. See Virginia Code 1-222.1
• Fiduciary: includes a guardian, committee, trustee, executor, conservator, or personal representative. See Virginia Code 64.2-100
• Fiduciary: A trustee, executor, or administrator.
• Fiduciary: means an original, additional, or successor personal representative, conservator, guardian, agent, or trustee. See Virginia Code 64.2-116
• Forgery: The fraudulent signing or alteration of another's name to an instrument such as a deed, mortgage, or check. The intent of the forgery is to deceive or defraud. ^{Source: OCC}
• Fraud: Intentional deception resulting in injury to another.
• Gift: A voluntary transfer or conveyance of property without consideration, or for less than full and adequate consideration based on fair market value.
• Grantor: The person who establishes a trust and places property into it.
• Guarantor: A party who agrees to be responsible for the payment of another party's debts should that party default. ^{Source: OCC}
• Guardian: A person legally empowered and charged with the duty of taking care of and managing the property of another person who because of age, intellect, or health, is incapable of managing his (her) own affairs.
• Guardian: includes a limited guardian. See Virginia Code 64.2-116
• in writing: include any representation of words, letters, symbols, numbers, or figures, whether (i) printed or inscribed on a tangible medium or (ii) stored in an electronic or other medium and retrievable in a perceivable form and whether an electronic signature authorized by Chapter 42. See Virginia Code 1-257
• Includes: means includes, but not limited to. See Virginia Code 1-218
• Income: means any periodic or other form of payment due an individual from any source and shall include, but not be limited to, income from salaries, wages, commissions, royalties, bonuses, dividends, severance pay, payments pursuant to a pension or retirement program, interest, trust income, annuities, capital gains, social security benefits, workers' compensation benefits, unemployment insurance benefits, disability insurance benefits, veterans' benefits, spousal support, net rental income, gifts, prizes or awards. See Virginia Code 63.2-1900
• Indemnification: In general, a collateral contract or assurance under which one person agrees to secure another person against either anticipated financial losses or potential adverse legal consequences. ^{Source: FDIC}
• Independent contractor: means an individual who (i) provides any service performed for remuneration or under any contract of hire, written or oral, express or implied, and (ii) is not an employee pursuant to the definition of "employment" in § 60. See Virginia Code 63.2-1900
• Information: means data, text, images, videos, sounds, codes, computer programs, software, databases, or something that is substantially similar. See Virginia Code 64.2-116
• Insurer: means an insurance company. See Virginia Code 38.2-100
• Inter vivos: Transfer of property from one living person to another living person.
• Interest rate: The amount paid by a borrower to a lender in exchange for the use of the lender's money for a certain period of time. Interest is paid on loans or on debt instruments, such as notes or bonds, either at regular intervals or as part of a lump sum payment when the issue matures. ^{Source: OCC}
• Intestate: Dying without leaving a will.
• Jurisdiction: (1) The legal authority of a court to hear and decide a case. Concurrent jurisdiction exists when two courts have simultaneous responsibility for the same case. (2) The geographic area over which the court has authority to decide cases.
• Lease: A contract transferring the use of property or occupancy of land, space, structures, or equipment in consideration of a payment (e.g., rent). ^{Source: OCC}
• Liabilities: The aggregate of all debts and other legal obligations of a particular person or legal entity.
• Lien: A claim against real or personal property in satisfaction of a debt.
• Life insurance: includes policies that also provide (i) endowment benefits; (ii) additional benefits incidental to a loss in the event of death, dismemberment, or loss by accident or accidental means; (iii) additional benefits to safeguard the contract from lapse or to provide a special surrender value, a special benefit or an annuity, in the event of total and permanent disability of the insured; and (iv) optional modes of settlement of proceeds. See Virginia Code 38.2-102
• Litigation: A case, controversy, or lawsuit. Participants (plaintiffs and defendants) in lawsuits are called litigants.
• Local board: means the local board of social services representing one or more counties or cities. See Virginia Code 63.2-100
• Marital deduction: The deduction(s) that can be taken in the determination of gift and estate tax liabilities because of the existence of a marriage or marital relationship.
• Month: means a calendar month and "year" means a calendar year. See Virginia Code 1-223
• Mortgage: The written agreement pledging property to a creditor as collateral for a loan.
• Noncustodial parent: means a responsible person who is or may be obligated under Virginia law for support of a dependent child or child's caretaker. See Virginia Code 63.2-1900
• Obligation: An order placed, contract awarded, service received, or similar transaction during a given period that will require payments during the same or a future period.
• Obligee: means (i) an individual to whom a duty of support is or is alleged to be owed or in whose favor a support order has been issued or a judgment determining parentage has been rendered, (ii) a state or political subdivision to which the rights under a duty of support or support order have been assigned or that has independent claims based on financial assistance provided to an individual obligee, or (iii) an individual seeking a judgment determining parentage of the individual's child. See Virginia Code 63.2-1900
• Obligor: means an individual, or the estate of a decedent, who (i) owes or is alleged to owe a duty of support, (ii) is alleged but has not been adjudicated to be a parent of a child, or (iii) is liable under a support order. See Virginia Code 63.2-1900
• Online tool: means an electronic service provided by a custodian that allows the user, in an agreement distinct from the terms-of-service agreement between the custodian and user, to provide directions for disclosure or nondisclosure of digital assets to a third person. See Virginia Code 64.2-116
• Payee: means any person to whom spousal or child support is to be paid. See Virginia Code 63.2-1900
• Person: means an individual; estate; business or nonprofit entity; public corporation; government or governmental subdivision, agency, or instrumentality; or other legal entity. See Virginia Code 64.2-116
• Person: means any association, aggregate of individuals, business, company, corporation, individual, joint-stock company, Lloyds type of organization, organization, partnership, receiver, reciprocal or interinsurance exchange, trustee or society. See Virginia Code 38.2-100
• Person: includes any individual, corporation, partnership, association, cooperative, limited liability company, trust, joint venture, government, political subdivision, or any other legal or commercial entity and any successor, representative, agent, agency, or instrumentality thereof. See Virginia Code 1-230
• Personal property: All property that is not real property.
• Personal representative: includes the executor of a will or the administrator of the estate of a decedent, the administrator of such estate with the will annexed, the administrator of such estate unadministered by a former representative, whether there is a will or not, any person who is under the order of a circuit court to take into his possession the estate of a decedent for administration, and every other curator of a decedent's estate, for or against whom suits may be brought for causes of action that accrued to or against the decedent. See Virginia Code 1-234
• Personal representative: means an executor, administrator, curator, designated successor or successor under the Virginia Small Estate Act (§ 64. See Virginia Code 64.2-116
• Power of attorney: means a record that grants an agent authority to act in the place of a principal. See Virginia Code 64.2-116
• Power of attorney: A written instrument which authorizes one person to act as another's agent or attorney. The power of attorney may be for a definite, specific act, or it may be general in nature. The terms of the written power of attorney may specify when it will expire. If not, the power of attorney usually expires when the person granting it dies. ^{Source: OCC}
• Principal: means an individual who grants authority to an agent in a power of attorney. See Virginia Code 64.2-116
• Process: includes subpoenas, the summons and complaint in a civil action, and process in statutory actions. See Virginia Code 1-237
• Public assistance: means Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF); auxiliary grants to the aged, blind and disabled; medical assistance; energy assistance; food stamps; employment services; child care; and general relief. See Virginia Code 63.2-100
• rates: means any rate of premium, policy fee, membership fee or any other charge made by an insurer for or in connection with a contract or policy of insurance. See Virginia Code 38.2-100
• real estate: includes lands, tenements and hereditaments, and all rights and appurtenances thereto and interests therein, other than a chattel interest. See Virginia Code 1-219
• Real property: Land, and all immovable fixtures erected on, growing on, or affixed to the land.
• Record: means information that is inscribed on a tangible medium or that is stored in an electronic or other medium and is retrievable in perceivable form. See Virginia Code 64.2-116
• Remainder: An interest in property that takes effect in the future at a specified time or after the occurrence of some event, such as the death of a life tenant.
• Remote computing service: means a custodian that provides to a user computer-processing services or the storage of digital assets by means of an electronic communications system, as defined in 18 U. See Virginia Code 64.2-116
• Service of process: The service of writs or summonses to the appropriate party.
• Settlement: Parties to a lawsuit resolve their difference without having a trial. Settlements often involve the payment of compensation by one party in satisfaction of the other party's claims.
• State: when applied to a part of the United States, includes any of the 50 states, the District of Columbia, the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico, Guam, the Northern Mariana Islands, and the United States Virgin Islands. See Virginia Code 1-245
• State: means any commonwealth, state, territory, district or insular possession of the United States. See Virginia Code 38.2-100
• state agency: means the same as that term is defined in § 2. See Virginia Code 1-206
• Statute: A law passed by a legislature.
• Summons: Another word for subpoena used by the criminal justice system.
• Terms-of-service agreement: means an agreement that controls the relationship between a user and a custodian. See Virginia Code 64.2-116
• Testator: A male person who leaves a will at death.
• Tort: A civil wrong or breach of a duty to another person, as outlined by law. A very common tort is negligent operation of a motor vehicle that results in property damage and personal injury in an automobile accident.
• Trustee: means a trustee under a probated will or an inter vivos trust instrument. See Virginia Code 64.2-100
• Trustee: includes a successor trustee. See Virginia Code 64.2-116
• Trustee: A person or institution holding and administering property in trust.
• United States: includes the 50 states, the District of Columbia the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico, Guam, the Northern Mariana Islands and the United States Virgin Islands. See Virginia Code 1-255
• User: means a person that has an account with a custodian. See Virginia Code 64.2-116
• Venue: The geographical location in which a case is tried.