A federal judge in Illinois has denied the plaintiffs' request for class certification in a lawsuit against Progressive Universal Insurance Company that alleges the carrier undervalues total-loss vehicle claims.
This claim dispute originated in September 2020, when the vehicles of Plaintiffs Normanda Holmes and Sherry Citchens-Wright were damaged in car accidents. Both plaintiffs claim that while their Progressive policies were supposed to pay the actual cash value of their respective vehicles, the carrier undervalued them by applying a significant downward adjustment to the base values of the comparable vehicles.
They also accuse Progressive of violating the Illinois Consumer Fraud and Deceptive Business Practices Act, breach of contract and breach of good faith.
According to the lawsuit, the plaintiffs requested class certification that would include: "All persons who made a first-party claim on a policy of insurance issued by Progressive Universal Insurance Company to an Illinois resident where the claim was submitted from February 18, 2012, through the date an order granting class certification is entered, and Progressive determined that the vehicle was a total loss and based its claim payment on an Instant Report from Mitchell where a Projected Sold Adjustment was applied to at least one comparable vehicle."
However, the judge ruled that the plaintiffs had not demonstrated that the proposed class met the predominance requirement of Rule 23(b)(3), which says a class action may be maintained if prior rules are satisfied and if "the court finds that the questions of law or fact common to class members predominate over any questions affecting only individual members, and that a class action is superior to other available methods for fairly and efficiently adjudicating the controversy."
Because of this finding, the plaintiffs' motion to certify was denied.
Progressive is not the only major insurer to recently face claims of undervaluing totaled vehicle claims. In March, an Arkansas court granted preliminary approval for an approximately $15.58 million settlement from State Farm in a class action that alleges the insurer underestimated the ACV of total-loss vehicle claims by applying arbitrary value adjustments based on third-party reporting.
State Farm admitted no wrongdoing in the settlement, and it is set for final approval in July.
(Photo credit: Ken Wolter/Shutterstock.com)
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