Car companies have deep pockets, therefore, they get sued all the time for the silliest things. A good deal of what you pay for the car goes to paying lawyers. Those of the car company, and especially those who start class action suits. When the suit is won or settled, the lawyers get a fat cut of the award, and the customers get a coupon for a free oil change or other valuable stuff.
A woman from Los Angeles has plaintiff lawyers very worried.
According to the Los Angeles Times, “Heather Peters is an angry consumer who knows she has little chance of winning a war with Honda Motor Co. and its army of high-priced lawyers.”
But what if that army of high-priced lawyers is disarmed and must stay home? Heather Peters has devised a strategy that cuts out the lawyers.
For years, there have been class action suits over the fuel economy of Honda’s
Civic hybrid. Plaintiffs said they were duped into buying an expensive car that doesn’t get the stated EPA mileage. In a proposed class-action lawsuit settlement, trial lawyers would get $8.5 million. Civic owners would get as little as $100 and rebate coupons for the purchase of a new vehicle.
Heather Peters won’t settle with Honda. Instead, she will plead her case at the Small Claims Court in Torrance. According to California law, neither party is allowed to bring a lawyer to Small Claims Court. Peters will sue on January 3rd, because in 2012, California raises the Small Claims limit to $10,000. Peters will be asking for the maximum.
She is also asking Honda owners to follow her example. She set up her DontSettleWithHonda.org website and a DontSettleWithHonda Twitter account. The site state-by-state instructions for filing these lawsuits.
According to the LA Times, 200,000 Civic hybrids were sold over six years. Used car buyers are eligible as well, which could bring the number of claimants to half a million.
“This could create a lot of problems in the industry,” said Aaron Jacoby, the Los Angeles defense attorney who heads the automotive industry group at the Fox law firm.
If revolutions can be started with Twitter, then surely groups of claimants can find each other and plan a united, but separate assault.
Mass filings could tax the resources of a company, which has to send an employee to the hearing if the state does not allow lawyers. Most of all, they could make plaintiff’s attorneys look for other deep pocket targets.
She may need a little help with the video presentation. Or maybe that’s part of the strategy.
One of the problems with small claims court is collecting. Getting a favorable judgement is one thing. Collecting the money is another problem.
(I used to be on the board of directors of a condo association, the board got judgements easily but collections were problematic).
But you were not suing big companies with fixed assets. She may have to get her judgment domesticated in one of the states where Honda has assets, then hire an out of state lawyer to attach bank funds or file a lien on property. However, this will cut some money out of her recovery. If enough people go this route, however, Honda will have a mess on its hands.
The hole in her theory is if appeals are allowed. In my state (Indiana) attorneys are allowed in small claims cases. After a judgment, the loser can appeal to one of the regular courts, and the case starts over – and this time, she would have to hire a lawyer, or else be at a severe disadvantage. With enough suits in any one state, Honda could move to consolidate them if they involve common issues. The courts will not like waves of similar cases any more than Honda will.
Oh we had a fixed asset – their home – and we knew where it was. But a lien against the property could not be collected unless the property was sold (if there was enough value, we were “second in line” to the mortgage holder). It was not really feasible to force a sale of the property to collect a several thousand dollar lien.
(This was in Indiana and we had an attorney file the paperwork to get the lien).
But a lien against the property could not be collected unless the property was sold (if there was enough value, we were “second in line” to the mortgage holder).
In this case, one could conceivably send the marshal or sheriff over to the corporate offices and start seizing assets if Honda lost and failed to pay.
But of course, it isn’t that simple. If Honda loses the small claims case, it could appeal and the case would start over, with attorneys. Despite the costs, I suspect that Honda would appeal a loss, if only to make an example out of the plaintiff and to discourage other cases.
And I would expect Honda to be represented by an attorney at the small claims case, because the company would probably send in-house counsel to represent them. It’s not as if the receptionist or a guy in the mail room is going to be carrying the water for a case like this.
One of the problems with small claims court is collecting
I was discussing this with a friend a couple of days ago. He’s inside counsel for a large corporation. Apparently they had a case where they ignored the judgement (not deliberately) and the sheriff did in fact show up at one of their facilities to collect.
Move to Ontario. Under the Condo Act (1998)your unit is in arrears at midnight on the last day of the month. By law, your unit must be liened before the 90th day the arrears occurred. The process can be expensive, but the good news is that the offending unit owner gets to pay all ‘reasonable’ costs. Banks will often step in and pay the arrears because the Condo Act supersedes the Bank Act and under a Power of Sale (also enforceable by the Condo Act), the building gets their money first, then the banks, then the rest of the creditors.
There is also a process called ‘attornment,’ whereby the tenant of a unit would be instructed to pay their rent to the Condo Corporation, not the unit owner.
Small Claims Courts are only for those Management Companies so incompetent that they forgot to exercise the Corporation’s rights in the proper manner or on time. Ooops!
This brings up so many issues, I don’t know where to start.
Unknown to me until a few weeks ago, I was apparently party to a class action lawsuit brought against eBay. I found out about this when I received my settlement check…..my settlement award was 35 CENTS. Yup, 35 cents. Wanna bet the lawyers got more than 35 cents?
It’s one thing to sue an individual in small claims, and an entirely different matter to sue a large corporation. When suing a large corporation/business in small claims court, be prepared to have your claim thrown out on some minor technicality as a matter of course. Small claims judges, who are political appointees in most jurisdictions, will show you the door within minutes of appearing in court if you trying to sue a large corporation. If this woman’s claim gets any traction at all, it’s because of the media circus surrounding her claim.
Finally, lawyers are largely responsible for having ruined this country. Most are parasites and sociopaths. I’m generally a live and let live kind of person, but I would have no problem of throwing lawyers into gulags and working the entire lot to death.
You shouldn’t be so quick to make blanket statements like that.
In reality it’s only 99% of lawyers who give all the rest a bad name.
“Finally, lawyers are largely responsible for having ruined this country. Most are parasites and sociopaths. I’m generally a live and let live kind of person, but I would have no problem of throwing lawyers into gulags and working the entire lot to death.”
While I also used to embrace this popular idea, I changed my mind when I needed lawyers to help me in a variety of situations, having been both a plaintiff and a defendant. You stop being a ‘live and let live’ person when you’re the one who’s been wronged. It also changes your mind when a few lawyers become personal friends with you, and you realize they’re just trying to make a living, helping people receive justice in an unjust world.
While there may well be the occasional half decent human being hidden amongst the rabble that comprise lawyerdom, the way to make society more just, does not involve enabling an overpaid bunch of leeches redistributing the wealth and income of others. Whether said leeches are politicians, bureaucrats, lawyers or judges.
If your car doesn’t give you the mileage you wish for, change your driving habit, or do more research next time. People lie, particularly marketers, politicians; and ta-da, lawyers.
Sorry, maybe you got lucky, but most of the lawyers I’ve had the displeasure of knowing have been pieces of filth.
A lot of my closest friends are lawyers. I can assure you that for most of them justice is much farther down on their list of priorities than billable hours.
Thirty-five cents?
Damn son, I got 17.
lol.
My eBay settlement in that class action suit (overcharging fees on certain transactions) was about $40 before lawyer fees.
After lawyer fees, I got a check for $2.42.
$0.04 for me. On what should I splurge?
Ha-ha-ha-ha I got 20 cents! And just in time for Christmas!
John
@harshciygar
6% for you and 94% for the lawyers. Sounds like correct lawyer math to me. Enjoy your 7-11 hotdog.
I got $3.22 from the ebay settlement and the check had to be cashed in 30 days, including the T-day holiday. I bet the lawyers got real nice BMWs and Audis out of that.
The solution is to have lawyers paid hourly rates based on industry standards, rather than 1/4 to 1/3rd of the pot. And a full accounting of the books would be in order, just like what we saw with the infamous Rose Law Firm. If they wanted a multi million dollar payday they would have to put the hours in and show it on paper.
A lawyer should be along any minute to remind us that if there is no jackpot then lawyers won’t take the case. Bull$hit. half a loaf is better than none and they would do it.
Most small claims courts allow up to 1000.00. That’s ten times more than most Honda Hybrid owners will get. Seems like a no brainer.
Most people are tired of getting gift certificates for oil changes while the suits clean up at the table.
GS, in most class actions the terms of the settlement have to be approved by the court. This includes what the attorneys are getting vs. the benefit to the plaintiffs. Courts are supposed to take into consideration the amount of work done by the plaintiff lawyers, and with reference to some fictional billable hour average. The obscene differential between benefit to litigants and benefit to litigators in the eBay case suggests that the system doesn’t work where the actual damage to the indiviaul plaintiffs are rather small. As long as class actions remain shake downs of major corporations, they will only benefit fat cat lawyers who manage to get onto the plaintiff’s steering committee.
“The solution is to have lawyers paid hourly rates based on industry standards, rather than 1/4 to 1/3rd of the pot.”
I was party to a class action suit where 100 people got $1000 each and the lawyer got $6 million. WAAAAY more than a third.
John
Hey, you really hit the jackpot — my eBay settlement check was twelve cents. Obviously, it cost more than three times that in postage to send it to me. I refused to cash it because I figured that doing so will impose more than 12 cents of costs on the banking system and we’ll all end up paying for that somehow down the line.
First a Tsunami/nuclear holocaust in Japan. Then devastating floods in Thailand. Now this?
What the hell is everyone’s problem with Honda? At least they didn’t get bailed out. THEY DIDN’T NEED TO BE!
With that said, I think i’ll need to change industries soon. Unless the owner of the company I work for decides a new brand to go with…
yore right Honda dont need to be bailed out, becuse they where sponsored by the U.S south and Tokyo’s currency manipulations.
I didn’t know that Ohio and Canada were in the U.S. south. I will have to sue my geography teacher.
I didn’t know that Ohio and Canada were in the U.S. south.
They were relocated to below the Mason-Dixon Line just a few weeks ago. (It was buried at the back of the paper, so you can be forgiven for missing it.)
Tokyo’s currency manipulations
Somebody needs to send them back to Currency Manipulation School. Somehow, the yen has managed to quadruple in value against the dollar over the last 40 years.
Ya, don’t even get me started on Soros…
Torrance, CA is in the South, of California. Honda’s US HQ was still there when I drove by it today. Its Nissan that moved from CA to TN several years ago.
Since Honda and the court where the plaintiff will file is in the same city, this should be interesting. Typically a corporate officer is served, since lawyers are not allowed. A low-level VP may have to show up if Honda wants to defend in court, rather than ignore or fight a default judgment later.
I wonder if California is like Michigan… Small claims suits can be moved to the circuit court by either party, where lawyers are allowed. And, when a class action is in progress against a company, they can have the case dismissed on that basis.
It depends on how much you’re asking. Just responding to the case and taking depositions is going to cost them $500. For a lot of companies, it’s cheaper to pay people to go away than fight them in court.
Rather seems to defeat the purpose of small claims court to allow the defendant to unilateraly move it to circuit court. Almost as though the laws have been gimmicked to the benefit of the local lawyers.
Does anyone have figures on how much gas mileage is lost from REAL gasoline to gasoline + 10% alcohol?
E10 has about 97% of the energy content of straight gasoline, so it should get about 3% less mpg. None of my 4 vehicles showed any measureable decrease in mileage when the switch over occurred.
Perhaps the electronics in modern cars can make some compensating adjustments? I know that if you have an old 70’s tank, even the ones designed to run on unleaded, you will notice the difference.
It’s not hard proof, but based on a couple of years of using the trip computer to calculate mpg, I am convinced that the mileage drop in my 1997 M3 was as much as 10% when I ran gas with 10% ethanol. Based on my highly scientific seat-of-the-pants testing, I am also convinced it had a material adverse effect on acceleration. Alas, it ultimately got to where I couldn’t find any stations selling pure gas.
There’s no physical reason that E10 should reduce your mileage that much. For about 5 years I’ve been keeping spreadsheets recording miles, gallons, and calculated actual mpg, not trip computer indicated, for 3 cars and a truck. You literally can’t tell when E10 was inflicted on us based on the mpg. Lots of folks will swear that there’s a 10-15% hit, but I’ll bet none of them actually had an accurate baseline to measure it against. There are lots of reasons to dislike E10, but significantly reduced fuel economy isn’t one of them.
Lots of folks will swear that there’s a 10-15% hit, but I’ll bet none of them actually had an accurate baseline to measure it against.
People are far better looking and much more adept at accurately measuring fuel economy on internet forums than they are in real life.
“There are lots of reasons to dislike E10, but significantly reduced fuel economy isn’t one of them.”
It was for me, and I’ll leave it at that. I stand by what I said about my mileage differentials. Different cars likely react differently to the use of different fuels.
cirats is right. Competent people are statistically insignificant, but his results are consistent with my own. In past years, there was always a dramatic difference whenever I had to buy reformulated gasoline for my ’88 from a Virginia population center where it was required during the winter instead of from a rural gas station where it wasn’t, even if my only ‘urban’ driving consisted of driving up an interstate exit ramp, stopping at a gas station, and getting back on the interstate. The result was always a tank that returned at least 10% less miles than the ones either before or after taking on gasohol. My mileage was also miserable for the year I had the car in California, returning to normal when I left. Perhaps it is a quirck of Motronic engine management that E10 causes a ridiculously rich mixture, but it was plain as day in that car.
Isn’t the fed mandate E-15 now? I think in MN it already is.
“People are far better looking and much more adept at accurately measuring fuel economy on internet forums than they are in real life.”
+1000 lol
I keep detailed records and I never saw an E10 ethanol hit.. actually had an mpg increase on self-blended E20 mix on a car with advanced timing. I have noticed mpg differences going from a high quality brand down to crap found in a 7-11 convenience store.. usually in the hottest part of summer.
Perhaps its a quirk of certain cars and their computers. Ethanol percentage is reported in the CAN-bus of many cars, I dont know how they actually sense this.
That’s not the issue here.
Early buyers of the Honda Civic Hybrid (2003 – 2004) started reporting after 18 to 24 months greatly diminished battery life, especially in warm climates. Honda denied there was anything wrong, but did a software patch to extend battery life. The software patch “worked” in that battery life was extended/returned to normal, but average MPG plummeted from 45 to 50 MPG (the original window sticker was 49/51 based on the old standard) to around 30 to 32 after the patch was done. This was observed by many customers. The ire brought down on Honda was that customers paid for the hybrid version that offered nothing after the patch that the 1.5L powered, cheaper Civic versions would offer from a fuel economy stand point.
After the class action lawsuit customers were given up to $100 and a voucher good for up to $1,000 toward a new Honda vehicle.
The bottom line is this is not an E10/E15 issue.
========================================
When I owned my Chevy Avalanche with the GM 5.3L Vortec V8 and 4-speed auto, I monitored my fuel economy like a hawk, and did a comparison on MPG on E10 versus pure gas (well likely E2 as almost all gasoline has a smidge of ethanol in it depending on winter/summer blend and region you live in). I found that I lost about 2 MPG in the Avalanche on E10, going from about an average of 15 MPG to 13 MPG; which when your fuel economy is that bad to begin with, 2 MPG is a big hit, about a 14% reduction in MPG.
…..”average mpg plummeted”….if your estimate of a 15 mpg discrepancy (after the modification) is correct, it sounds like an easily winnable case on the surface, and one can’t blame this woman for seeking redress. Not sure how the various states tolerate “expert” witnesses in their Small Claims Courts, though. And I don’t think they’re big on awarding “damages”, restricting most rewards to provable actual losses…….which could be worth pursuing if you had a very high mileage hybrid, but nowhere near $10,000.
Also, re your E10 calculations…….they mirror my own anecdotal experience when comparing the two fuels in my own car….there is a definite improvement using 100% gasoline, maybe 5% in my case.
Besides the increased use of gasoline the woman also suffered from a lower resale value (if she sold the car?).
Honda really messed up a basic part of hybrid engineering in this generation of the Civic.. either low quality batteries or under-cooling/over-use of the batteries. Its a failure of Honda engineering.. by contrast the batteries in Toyota’s or Ford hybrids have proven to be bulletproof. Many cases of a Prius going over 300k miles with the original battery.
I think this case will be dismissed/transfered on the first day.
Ten percent ethanol I’ll see 2-3 mpg drop on most engines. At 30K miles annual there isn’t much of a savings when the price is about the same.
HMC will do the PR move to sooth things over. HMC needs to revamp the product line or find themselves in Saab’esque shape making lawnmowers and generators. Civic revamp is a prime example.
American motorists fall into two categories:
1. Plaintiffs
2. Future plaintiffs
Like Pavlov’s dog, I must respond to a story about ‘Honda’ and ‘lawsuit’.
My only experience with Honda ended with a lemon lawsuit against them for a bad 2005 Odyssey. I bought the car new, and the next morning – with 26 miles on it – one of the power sliding doors failed. The next 20 months were a cycle of failed repairs, dealer-loaned cars, appeals to the district manager, damage in the repair shop, ridicule about how I don’t use the doors properly, and general defense of the unassailable good name of Honda. They couldn’t believe it when I told them I wished I had bought a Chrysler.
The car had other problems, too, including failure of both turn signals in the first week, warped brakes, and a rear seat cable which pulled clean out of the seat (also in the first week). But the door issue is what led us into lemon law court. I even demanded a new vehicle, with no luck.
In the end, we ‘won’ the suit be receiving a check for $1700 and no claim of wrongdoing by Honda. I traded the car a week later for an old, trusty Caravan.
I might still be a Honda customer if they had just exchanged the car as I originally requested, but instead they’ve lost me and anyone else I can persuade to stay away.
Having said all that, I am dubious of any legal claims about fuel economy (even against Honda), since there are so many variables in it.
Your case involved a defective product. The Civic Hybrid case involves nothing beyond fuel economy, a dangerous precedent if it wins. You’d think automakers would insert an asterisk on their marketing materials to this effect: “Actual mileage will vary according to climate, road conditions and also how much of a dipshit you are.”
The power sliding door technology used by Toyota, Honda and Nissan was all patent sharing with…
…you guessed it, General Motors.
I loved the option, it is like having an extra arm and makes it easy for kids, but the damn things are freakin’ complicated with alignment, latches, safety catches, and computer control programming. On the GM U-body vans God forbid you do something like change the battery, because that kills the “programming” on the doors and they don’t even know if they are closed or open.
I once considered buying, ca. 2006, a small Peugeot coupe with dual sliding door, one each for driver and front passenger. My mother, who was visiting from the States, accompanied me on the test drive. Partway thru the drive we pulled under an overhang so I could check out the operation of the rear hatch. The driver’s sliding door then jammed and refused to close and I had to drive back to the dealer with the door ajar IN THE RAIN! This pretty much soured me on the whole remote-controlled sliding door idea, and by extension, the car as well. The car may have been French, but the doors were made by Delphi…
My Mom’s 2005 Chevy Uplander power sliding door is working fine at 100,000 miles. Sorry the Japanese couldn’t execute a design properly. At least GM can do something right.
A few things:
1) “A judgement is merely a license to hunt. It does not immediately result in satisfaction of the debt just as buying your elk tag is a guarantee that you will find and shoot an elk during elk season.” My business law professor Lyle Velure JD in 1991.
2) “All these years of buying Hondas, then I bought this piece of shit Honda minivan! It’s worse than my F%$cking Cayman!” One of my wife’s county Bar Association Friends. If an attorney can’t obtain justice and satisfaction in court, there’s little hope for mere unwashed mortals.
Is it true that the car consumes more than promised? Here in Europe we have a drive cycle (that are different from North America) that contains very little high speed driving. This might be typical if you are living in London or Bologna. But here in Sweden we are driving mostly on big roads in 45-65 mph with very little traffic. I had a Toyota Avensis and no problems reaching the consumtion figures. Then I bought a Toyota Rav 4 and was very dissapointed. Why? The gearing, drag coefficient was not optimized for highway driving. But I am sure it met the figures against the driving cycle.
These people have no case.
All EPA labels, and EPA numbers quoted in ads, say something to the effect that “Your mileage may vary” all the way to “These numbers are for comparison only. Your mileage will be lower.” They’ve said this for years.
It is not Honda’s or anyone else’s fault that the buyers skipped over the fine print.
Caveat Emptor.
I wonder just how far off her MPG numbers are. I also wonder what type of driving she does and where. Unless Honda doesn’t show up for court, it’s hard to see how this woman can win. The EPA numbers are just that — the EPA’s. They are based on a test protocol that is developed and enforced by the feds, who, in some cases, run the tests themselves. Manufacturers don’t make these numbers up. In addition, the MPG numbers are there for comparison purposes — they aren’t a guarantee. If this dingbat wins, and others follow her example, expect to pay for her victory when you next purchase a Honda — or any other vehicle.
Honda had invested so much into their failed hybrids ignoring their bread and butter cars and making Acura into an example of what not to follow for a “luxury” car label. Now even after they sold no where near their projected sales they get sued by owners who don’t get the mileage Honda claimed. Now that’s a knife in the back. Honda was never a me too / 2nd fiddle to Toyota until the turn of the century. So they missed the boat on advancing standard engine technology in their main cars losing competitive advantage, then they cancel all US bound diesel options, they start a Jet engine company, they develop a fuel cell vehicle that they leased to what 20 total people over the past 2 years? When is Honda’s current management going to get the pink slip and put people back in charge who know what a Honda product should be.
With mis directed development plans, UGLY new designs, falling quality standards and now a spate of lawsuits, Honda is the new GM of Japan
It’s amazing isn’t it? A story about a Honda lawsuit, about Honda’s hiccups, and the usual suspects just can’t resist dragging General Motors into it.
I see it this way. Honda is acting like what we knew GM as (full of itself and always had an excuse – everything if fine please look over there). GM still has its fits and acts like this. It is funny that Honda has fallen so far from its core principles by becoming a mid size vehicle maker betting on unproven technology (their hybrids do not compete well and do not even live up to the lowered expectations – think of the billions Honda has poured into this failure and is now trying to bluff its way out instead of retreat, admit failure and fix the problem).
With one big exception: GM was the largest car company, indeed, the largest world corporation, for many decades. GM has been in nearly every single nation, and many of those since the beginning of auto production. As #1 for over 70 years, GM had a big bulls-eye painted on its back in the media and it had a responsibility (that,yes, did eventually lead to hubris)to lead Detroit out of the perfect storm that hit between 1971 thru 1974.
And GM tried. Years before their time, there were disasters like the 8-6-4 Cadillac engines, hydraulic bumpers that rusted and fell off, plastic fascias that cracked and aged, fuel injection systems awaiting a proper management system, low carbon steel for weight reduction… well, the list of sins is long and is constantly paraded out by the press, decades later to demonstrated GM’s arrogance.
All Japan Inc had to do was wait out the malaise era with roller skates powered by tiny motors while the dinosaurs in Detroit thrashed around in the dark. Sort of like the first mammals in the raptor’s day.
Honda has never even been on the radar. At best, it is 6th or 7th in world sales. It has virtually no presence in China or Brazil, the two fastest growing markets in the world right now. In fact, North America accounts for over 1/3 of Honda’s sales and HALF its revenues. What does that say about North America? Honda doesn’t sell anywhere else, outside of Japan. Hmmm. Why is that? Why did Japan Inc spend such enormous buckets of cash, propped up by the hapless Japanese consumer for decades, to invade our markets? Not Europe’s, not Brazil’s, not India’s, but North America.
Are we that gullible, or was there an agenda? The Euros were (are) wary. Brazil put up many demands, which Ford, GM and others had no trouble meeting.
Nope, Honda was hell-bent on bending North America to its will. It nearly worked, too. The happy, shiny image that was carefully crafted since the mid-70s was a masterpiece of tenacity and slyness.
However, the internet has finally blown the mythology sky high.
GM had the build it and people will buy it mindset and it eventually failed. GM due to inflexibility would miss out on new new demographics and trends often arriving late to the party with an embarrassing also-ran. GM stood in its own way for being successful.
Honda used to be nimble and flexible and could bring to market a quality new niche product. It did not make the market come to it – it offered innovation and quality in an affordable, fun to drive package. Then in the mid 90’s everything went awry. They adopted the need to have to compete in every category with rushed to market products and react to niches (if you are not the niche you often are too late to ever recoup your investment). Think IMA hybrid system Honda has – does not live up to the competition and costs the same (You’d figure this would be 1/2 the price increase as it’s not a full parallel system). Honda simply rested on its laurels and forgot about its past by making big people movers / appliances and no longer cars unique to Honda. The biggest complaint in most Hondas was road noise – well it as always forgiven b/c the cars handled better than the competition and offered driving excitement. When Honda adopted to make their cars handle like the late Buicks and what now is Toyota and still have road noise – doesn’t work.
I predict that Heather will lose her case. Doesn’t she know that nobody gets the said EPA mileage with any vehicle? Conditions vary everywhere. There’s climate and weather, traffic, driver’s attention, stop and start driving. The EPA’s numbers are obtained under controlled conditions. The Honda rep will have his data together and will tear her up. She better hope the judge is a family member.
I don’t know if it’s that simple. If you look at all of the facts surrounding this case, it appears as though the real problem is that there is a defect with the batteries used in the Civic Hybrid.
Apparently, Honda, in order to extend the life of the battery to match customer expectations, made a software change that has greatly reduced real-world mileage.
Owners are left with the choice of a hybrid with a battery that wears out quickly, and gets the higher mileage, or a hybrid with a long-lasting battery that doesn’t get much better mileage than that of a regular Civic.
I don’t know if it’s that simple
You may be right. The fact that the court rejected an earlier settlement because it didn’t provide enough of a payout to the plaintiffs would suggest that it may not be that simple, after all.
I do wonder how they would quantify damages, though. It’s one thing to win the case, it’s another to win $10,000 in damages for it. The current settlement that is up for approval provides a longer warranty on the battery, up to $200 in cash, and a $1,000 rebate that can be used for a limited time, and then only to buy another Honda.
She might win the case in small claims court and she might win over $200. But I doubt that she would be able to justify to the court that she deserves a settlement up to allowed maximum, even under the best of circumstances. It’s not as if she was lit on fire or the car ran over her cat…
What was the price differential between the hybrid and the Otto-powered versions?
What was the expected lifespan for the battery? What is the replacement cost for the batteries? How do these compare to similar batteries?
What would be the average increase in annual operating costs (possibly adjusted up/down for individual usage profiles)?
What is the additional depreciation due to these cars essentially being re-flashed to become more-exotic, but no more efficient, versions of an Otto-cycle Civic with nothing to really show for itself ==> meaning resale value may be only equal to, possibly less than, an Otto-cycle Civic.
I’m sure that within the boundaries of the answers to these questions, one could develop a fair settlement scheme based on vehicles that were certified to, and premium-priced on, a level of unsustainable economic performance.
Whether deliberate, or due to incompetent development testing, it still is, in effect, a bait and switch situation (only difference was that the switch took time to identify itself.)
Consider this: if these vehicles had been certified to meet a given regulation, and then due to some unsustainable reason had to be tweaked, and had fallen into non-compliance, then Honda would likely have been compelled to rectify the issue at its own cost, or would have faced fines.
I can beat EPA numbers by 20-40%f with anywhere between two and eight cylinders. I don’t idle the car in the morning waiting for it to warm up and don’t spend time in drive thru’s waiting for my double espresso mocha.
I heard that when lawyers die they go straight to hell.
I am not sure why anyone would buy a hybrid. I think all the extra weight of the batteries and electric motor eliminate any of the advantage. I think that one would be naive to expect “huge” gas savings with a hybrid.
If you want to save gas buy a small, stick shift car… much less to go wrong and eventually to be disappointed in.
If you insist on a hybrid, don’t be a chop and sue the manufacturer to make your self feel better about your own poor choices.
Any country is only as good as the people in it. No system of law or government can save a people’s from themselves.
While lawyers may be parasites, there is also a widespread culture that accepts lawsuits as an acceptable course of action. If people stopped trying to grasp at ‘their share’, lawyers would have alot less to do.
Personally, I’m ok with lawyers, just not lawyer’s pay. Lawyer’s salary should be capped at $150,000/year, based on 40 hours/week billing less 2 weeks for vacation. Not a penny more.
You don’t need to cap lawyer salaries to make most of them disappear. In civilized countries, unlike in the USA, you can file a lawsuit against anyone, the difference is, IF YOU LOSE, YOU ARE OBLIGATED BY LAW TO PAY YOUR INTENDED VICTIM’S LEGAL EXPENSES. Too many cases are settled in the US because the object of the lawsuit decides it would be cheaper to settle than to litigate. It’s outright extortion on the part of the legal profession. If people knew that they would have to pay if they didn’t prevail, 90% of lawsuits would dry and blow away….as would 90% of lawyers.
Damn!
I`m only getting 13.7 city in my 740iL
Not the 14.5 as on the EPA sticker..
Time to MAKE EM PAY UP!
….”make em pay”……the site of a wronged and impoverished BMW owner will bring tears to any judge’s eyes……your only problem will be finding one who won’t have to excuse him/herself, as most drive iLs themselves. Assuming you do get a judgement, collection should be no problem……..pleading poverty would not be an option for that Bavarian colossus.
Maybe I missed it, but I didn’t see anyone mention this fundamental problem with the initial ‘problem’ of lawyers:
Small claims court will not exclude lawyers from the process.
When you sue a company, who shows up to represent them? Does she think it will be the president of Honda? You’d better believe that the person they send will be a lawyer. Also, who will prepare their case? Who will prepare/train/coach their representative? Yep, more lawyers. She will have no chance, and every big company knows that. And once she fails, so will consumers.
Don’t expect anything to change.
This strikes me as kind of weird. In every place I have been, corporate persons MUST be represented by counsel in any court, even though individuals may represent themselves. So, a rule that bars a corporation (or any other kind of person) from being represented by counsel of their choice in a court of law strikes me as a huge due process violation . . . unless, as is the case in my neck of the woods, small claims court decisions are appealable de novo to the court of general jurisdiction. (“De Novo” means you start all over again and the initial decision is worth nothing.)
So long as Honda can prove that the car which achieved the rated EPA numbers is the same as the version offered for sale, there’s no case. The woman’s beef is with the EPA test, not with Honda. It doesn’t matter whether the software was altered to prolong battery life or not. (Honda’s only obligation is to have the battery last for the duration of whatever warranty they offer on it.)
Which is why, as others have pointed out, the EPA numbers are always (in fact required to be) advertised with disclaimers (i.e. “your mileage will vary, etc.”)