Jeffrey Kaufman

Jeff has successfully practiced law for nearly 50 years, in the areas of commercial litigation, business disputes, insurance coverage, environmental liability, class actions, construction defect, real estate, contract disputes, personal injury, property damage, and maritime and admiralty.

Building on his many years of law practice experience in trials, mediations and arbitrations, in 2006 Jeff began mediating disputes after completing 40 hours of Certified Comprehensive Mediator Training.  He also completed courses in Transitioning to an ADR Practice, Principles of Mediation, Appellate Mediation, and Mediation of Intellectual Property Disputes, all sponsored by the American Bar Association Section on Dispute Resolution, of which he is a member, as well as a course in Meditation "Do's and Don'ts" sponsored by the Bar Association of San Francisco.  Jeff is a Member of the Marin County Superior Court Settlement Conference Panel, the Bar Association of San Francisco Mediation Services panel, and has served as a pro-tem settlement judge in San Francisco and as a Small Claims Court judge.  He also trained for and serves as an arbitrator for the San Francisco Bar Association Fee Dispute Arbitration Program.  Respected mediators endorse him as "creative," "productive," "effective in driving large, ego-filled groups towards consensus," with "a keen sense of settlement dynamics," and "difficult to imagine a more qualified person."

Jeff has special expertise and extensive experience in insurance coverage advice and litigation, complex commercial litigation, bad faith litigation, environmental litigation, and appellate advocacy.  Jeff has represented and advised insurers and insureds in hundreds of coverage disputes involving general liability, personal injury liability, advertising injury liability, property, agent errors and omissions, attorney errors and omissions, psychologist errors and omissions, other professional liability, umbrella and excess coverage, employment practices liability, auto, uninsured and underinsured motorists coverage, homeowners, OL&T, builders risk, premises liability, products liability, operations liability, pollution, asbestos, environmental, intellectual property, reinsurance, workers' compensation and employers' liability, surety, and fidelity.  For many years he served as national or regional coverage counsel for several nationwide insurers.  He was the 2012-13 Chair of the Insurance Coverage and Bad Faith Group of the International Society of Primerus Law Firms and the editor of its Compendium of Principles of Law of Bad Faith in Fifty States and D.C. 

Jeff has the AV rating by Martindale Hubbell, the highest rating for ethics and legal ability based on reviews of his peers. He was also selected by Martindale Hubbell as one of San Francisco’s Top AV-Rated Lawyers.  In addition, after being nominated by his peers, he was selected as a Northern California Super Lawyer in 2007, 2008, 2010, 2011, 2012, 2014, 2015, 2016, 2017, 2018, 2019, and 2020, representing the top 5% of the attorneys in the area.  His selections have been in the areas of Alternative Dispute Resolution and insurance Coverage.

Jeff has a winning track record for his clients based on thorough preparation, well crafted arguments and carefully devised strategies. His negotiating skills, backed by substantial trial experience, help bring cases to conclusion at a time and in a manner which works to the advantage of his clients.  As a mediator, he brings these skills to bear along with his substantial people skills and ability to listen and discern what motivates litigants, in order to help parties craft a resolution they can all accept, rather than one a court imposes.  He has seen the excesses and waste of litigation and the drain and strain it causes on financial and emotional resources.  Jeff thoroughly enjoys and looks forward to the challenge of finding a solution that's a win-win for all.  

As a lawyer, Jeff has tried large, complex cases to judgment or verdict.  In one, he obtained a well publicized judgment from the Federal District Court in Philadelphia which saved his client an estimated $100 million, in addition to pretrial rulings which protected another $150 million.  He also obtained summary judgments in a case involving coverage for clergy abuse claims in which the demand was in the tens of millions, in a federal district court case involving advertising injury coverage, in a case involving attorney errors and omissions coverage, in a general liability insurance coverage case involving a claim against an insured vineyard developer and manager (affirmed by the Federal Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit), and in a case involving insurance agent errors and omissions coverage. He has also obtained summary judgments in cases involving construction defect litigation, environmental contamination, and insurer bad faith. Other trial victories include litigation over contract disputes in which he obtained awards totaling millions of dollars for his clients.

During the course of his practice, Jeff has handled litigation not only in California, but also in Ohio, Illinois, Indiana, New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Washington, D.C., and Guam. His appellate practice has included cases before the California Courts of Appeal, the California Supreme Court, the United States Courts of Appeals for the First and Ninth Circuits, and the United States Supreme Court.

Jeff has spoken at and contributed papers to several local and national conferences on insurance matters, and has conducted in-house trainings for clients. He was editor of the K&L California Insurance Law Update and author of the Editor's Corner.