§ 9.004.Applicability

Two carve-outs, and both point to statutes with sanction machinery of their own.

The chapter does not apply to the Deceptive Trade Practices-Consumer Protection Act or to Chapter 21, Insurance Code.

The consumer protection act carries its own answer to a groundless claim. It permits a court to award a defendant attorney’s fees and costs where an action is found to be groundless in fact or law, or brought in bad faith or for harassment — the same ground this chapter covers, on the same standard.

Two overlapping regimes over one claim would produce duplicate motions and inconsistent outcomes, which is what the carve-out avoids.

The Insurance Code exclusion works the same way for the unfair claim settlement practices provisions, which likewise supply their own remedy against a frivolous action.

The exclusions matter because those claims would otherwise be inside the chapter. Both are statutory claims for damages arising from conduct treated as tortious, which is exactly what the applicability section describes.

Note what the carve-out does not do. It removes the chapter, not every sanction. Rule 13 of the Rules of Civil Procedure and the later sanctions chapter continue to apply, so a groundless consumer or insurance pleading is still exposed.

Where a suit pleads both a consumer claim and an ordinary tort claim, the exclusion is drawn by statute rather than by lawsuit — the chapter is unavailable as to the excluded claim and available as to the rest.