Three-C Body Shops, Inc., announced that it has reached a settlement with State Farm after two-and-a-half years of litigation involving more than 140 separate claims seeking damages in excess of $300,000.
Bob Juniper, second-generation owner and CEO of Three-C Body Shops, filed a lawsuit against State Farm on behalf of 146 customers over Three-C’s billings associated with the handling of total loss vehicles, where the insurer declined to provide ample compensation to its customers. The issues included – but were not restricted to – processes such as hazardous waste, labor related to dismantling, mechanical, diagnostic time, access, rough pulls, accessing codes, relocation of disabled vehicle, fluid/debris clean-up, collision wrap, clean-up of broken glass, administrative time performing research for factory repair methods and numerous other processes.
“The time and efforts involved in vehicles once considered repairable and then deemed total losses are often considered by insurers to be a ‘cost of doing business,'” said Juniper. “However, when a vehicle becomes a total loss, such labor and administrative activities become burdensome and take considerable time away from our efforts to serve our repair customers. Such activities, time and activities are all too often unappreciated and ignored, and we sought to receive due compensation for our efforts. The costs involved in processing total losses are often higher than the amounts State Farm had been willing to provide for, and our ongoing efforts to amicably resolve the issues on behalf of our customers were unsuccessful. The only recourse left was to seek a court’s ruling on the matter, and as such I took an Assignment of Proceeds from our customers and sought recovery on their behalf.
“We are pleased to have settled this group of cases, and I presume State Farm is as well. It is never a good situation for the customer when an insurer and repairer clash over such issues, especially when litigation results. I’m confident the settlement will enable our two companies to better serve the needs of our customers and our respective businesses regardless if a vehicle is repairable or should be deemed to be a total loss.”
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