Lawsuits against Ford Motor Company over cars with alleged defective transmissions are piling up. The so-called "dual clutch" transmissions are in 2011 to 2016 Fiestas and 2012 to 2016 Focuses. Jason Levine is with the Center for Auto Safety. He says Ford knew it had a problem right away, but tried to ignore it. He says the defective transmission resulted in thousands of complaints. "They (the transmissions) were shuddering, they were slipping, it created a whole host of performance problems," says Levine. Levine says Ford faces lawsuits and fines globally, as well as in the U.S. Australia fined Ford $10 million, and Thai courts have awarded damages to owners of Fiestas and Focuses for the defective transmissions. One of the lawsuits in the U.S., a class action, is currently before a federal appeals court. Attorneys for Public Citizen are asking the court to reject a proposed $35 million settlement, calling it a raw deal which will result in only a tiny fraction of owners getting compensation. Ford Motor Company says it believes the settlement in the class action lawsuit is fair. The automaker says it does not comment on pending litigation, but it is committed to providing top-quality vehicles for its customers.<doc-sep>Sponsored Links A Ford lawsuit is nothing new; there are many of them ongoing at any given time. Several suits are going on over alleged misleading fuel economy for the 2019 Ford Ranger truck right now. Lawsuits are also still going against Ford that are focusing on the transmissions used in some models of the Ford Focus and Ford Fiesta. This Ford lawsuit was a class action against Ford claiming that 2012 through 2016 Ford Focus and 2011 through 2016 Ford Fiesta sedans with the dual-clutch transmissions were prone to all manner of problems, including premature wear, shuddering, slipping, bucking, jerking, and hesitation. The complaints in the case also allege that the transmissions in the cars could cause sudden or delayed acceleration. Ford faces a potential $4 billion liability over the transmission issues in those cars. More than 1.9 million customers who purchased or leased one of the cars claim that Ford lied to unload the cars with faulty transmissions and then blamed the drivers for the issues. Ford came to a settlement in the class action for $35 million negotiated by a lawyer called Ryan Wu. Wu argued at an appeal on April 8th for a panel of appellate judges in Pasadena, California to leave that $35 million settlement in place. However, Michael Kirkpatrick of Public Citizen, a Washington, D.C. nonprofit consumer group, argued that the settlement is a good deal for Ford and a bad deal for the customers. Judges are still deciding on whether they will uphold or toss the settlement. The ruling will likely come by December according to lawyers involved in the case. Ford says that it denies any allegations in the lawsuit, but decided it was better to settle the case and move on. Ford has warned shareholders of the pending litigation having to do with the transmission in question indicating the automaker thinks the settlement will be tossed and the Ford lawsuit will resume in court. Subscribe to Ford Authority for around-the-clock Ford news coverage. Source: Freep Sweepstakes Of The Month: 2021 Ford Mustang Shelby GT500 plus $25K in cash. Details here.<doc-sep>More than 1.9 million unhappy customers who purchased or leased a Ford Focus or Fiesta say the company lied to unload cars with faulty transmissions on unsuspecting buyers and then blamed the drivers for problems they experienced. As a result, Ford Motor Co. faces a potential $4 billion liability, lawyer Ryan Wu said last month during a U.S. Court of Appeals hearing during heated discussion with judges. He was trying to convince a panel of appellate judges in Pasadena, California, on April 8 to leave in place a $35 million settlement his law firm negotiated to resolve a class-action lawsuit against Ford. At the hearing, Michael Kirkpatrick of Public Citizen, a nonprofit Washington, D.C.-based consumer group handling the case for free, argued that the proposed settlement provided a sweet deal for Ford and a raw deal for its customers. Ford customers claim in legal filings their 2012-16 Focus and 2011-16 Fiesta sedans were built with dual-clutch transmissions prone to “shuddering, slipping, bucking, jerking, hesitation while changing gears, premature internal wear, delays in downshifting and, in some cases, sudden or delayed acceleration.” More:Sedans ain’t dead, and some of them are sweet deals More:Ford Motor Co. under criminal investigation over emissions certification In a statement to the Free Press on Wednesday, the company said, "Ford is committed to providing our customers with top-quality vehicles. We continue to deny the allegations in this lawsuit, but rather than continuing with the litigation, Ford entered into a settlement agreement with lawyers representing these plaintiffs. That settlement is fair and appropriate and we look forward to final court approval." Judges are deciding now whether to uphold or toss the settlement. Lawyers involved with the case say a ruling will likely come by December. Judges challenged Wu on whether the deal he negotiated was fair, and if the lower court correctly assessed the value of the settlement. Wu said yes, noting previous courts have upheld the fairness of class-action cases where only 3% of the plaintiffs were compensated, as he worked to bring closure to a case filed in 2012. Warning to stockholders Then, less than three weeks after the California hearing, Ford warned shareholders of legal exposure in a Securities and Exchange Commission filing under the subhead, "Consumer Matters." “We are currently a defendant in a significant number of litigation matters relating to the performance of vehicles equipped with DPS6 transmissions,” said the last item on a 70-page document dated April 25 and signed by Cathy O’Callaghan, Ford vice president and controller. “We are a defendant in numerous actions in state and federal courts alleging damages based on state and federal consumer protection laws and breach of warranty obligations. Remedies under these statutes may include repurchase, civil penalties, and plaintiff’s attorney fees. In some cases, plaintiffs also include an allegation of fraud.” Stranded with Mom Kirkpatrick said the timing "would suggest Ford thinks the settlement is going to be vacated. That’s what we’ve asked the Court of Appeals to do, send it all back down to the district court. Given the way the oral argument went, Ford’s lawyers anticipate losing the appeal. And they want to get out ahead of this. They have this huge liability they thought they had put to bed through a class-action settlement that was an exceptionally good deal for them.” If history is any indication, the situation facing Ford is grim. A California jury awarded Ariel Myers of Los Angeles $550,000 after finding that Ford acted with malice and committed fraud by concealing that the transmission in his 2014 Ford Focus was seriously defective, inducing him to purchase the car, despite a history of massive numbers of transmission failures, according a news release after the April 6, 2018, verdict from the nonprofit Consumers for Auto Reliability and Safety based in Sacramento. Within three days of purchasing his car on July 29, 2014, the transmission began to slip and shudder. Myers went back repeatedly for repairs, but the transmission continued to overheat, slip and make the car dangerous to drive, the news release said at the time. Myers needed the car to get to work and take his mother to dialysis. When the transmission overheated, his mother missed her appointment as they sat on the side of the road for help. When Myers sought a refund, Ford refused. Just before the trial jury was selected, Ford admitted it had violated lemon laws, the consumer advocacy group noted. “Ford has appealed the Myers judgment,” Kirkpatrick said. “But remember that Ford agreed to pay Myers $132,141 on the breach-of-warranty claims before going to trial on the consumer fraud claims. Even if Myers loses on appeal, Ford will have to pay $132,141 plus costs and attorneys’ fees.” That’s just one guy. In addition to the class-action case, an estimated 1,200 individual consumer fraud cases are pending in California, and a "mass action" lawsuit on behalf of 12,300 buyers has been filed in Wayne County Circuit Court by drivers from throughout the United States who declined to join the class action lawsuit. Ruling: 'Unconscionable' conduct While cases simmer in the U.S., Ford has been penalized globally. The company engaged in “unconscionable and misleading or deceptive conduct” and made “false or misleading representations in its response to customer complaints,” according to the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission. It hit Ford with a $10 million fine (about $7.5 million in U.S. dollars) on April 26, 2018, in response to the company’s handling of thousands of complaints between May 2015 and November 2016 — one of the largest fines in Australian history handed down under consumer law. The fine in Australia also covered complaints involving Ford EcoSport owners. "In most cases, Ford refused to provide a refund or a no-cost replacement vehicle to consumers, even after vehicles had undergone multiple repairs that had not resolved consumers' complaints," Rod Sims, commission chairman, said at the time. Ford told customers that "shuddering" in the vehicle was the result of the way that buyers had been driving, he noted. 'Overwhelmed' with complaints<doc-sep>A panel of judges in California is weighing an appeal of a $35 million settlement of a class-action lawsuit against Ford Motor Co ., brought by a consumer group that says the settlement represents a sweat deal for the automaker, the Detroit Free Press reports Initially filed on March 24, 2017, and granted final approval in October of that year, the settlement addresses complaints from 1.9 million current or former owners of 2012-2016 Focus and 2011-2016 Fiesta models built with Ford's PowerShift dual-clutch transmissions. The customers allege the transmissions are prone to shudder, slip, jerk or hesitate when changing gears, resulting in premature wear and sudden or delayed acceleration. The settlement stipulates that owners or lease holders could be eligible to repurchase their vehicle through arbitration, get cash payments up to $2,325 or receive discount certificates of up to $4,650 toward purchasing a new vehicle The nonprofit consumer group Public Citizen is appealing the settlement, which it says represents a raw deal for consumers. They want the judges to tear up the settlement and send the case back to the district court. "This was a windfall release for Ford," Michael Kirkpatrick, an attorney for the group, told the Freep. "People would be giving up their claims of very high value. We know Ford has been settling cases for $75,000 right off the bat when people bring their own lawsuits under California consumer protection law. "While it awaits a ruling on the appeal, the Freep reports that Ford faces an estimated 1,200 individual cases alleging consumer fraud in California, plus a "mass action" lawsuit filed in Wayne County (Michigan) Circuit Court representing 12,300 buyers who declined to join the class action suit and seek to have Ford award damages individually. Ford in a statement called the settlement "fair and appropriate." A ruling on the appeal is reportedly expected by December.The appeal is separate from a class-action lawsuit filed in federal court earlier this week alleging that Ford deceived customers about the fuel economy of the 2019 Ranger pickup and used a "mileage cheat device."<doc-sep>
Photo : Justin Sullivan ( Getty ) Around the world, 1.9 million customers who bought a Ford Focus or Fiesta are taking the automaker to task for selling faulty cars to unsuspecting customers. Ford is facing a potential $4 billion lawsuit, though the company denies knowingly selling poorly built cars. Ford customers specifically found problems with their 2012-16 Focus and 2011-16 Fiesta sedans. According to the legal filings, the dual-clutch transmissions were prone to “shuddering, slipping, bucking, jerking, hesitation while changing gears, premature internal wear, delays in downshifting and, in some cases, sudden or delayed acceleration,” the Detroit Free Press reports. This is a huge complaint. People have been unhappy with Ford’s gearboxes for years, including plenty of readers here at Jalopnik. That’s not the ideal experience to have behind the wheel of your car. Ford’s lawyer Ryan Wu argued last month during a U.S. Court of Appeals hearing that judges that they should lower the settlement from $4 billion to $35 million. Judges argued that Wu’s settlement was unfair to the millions of customers who were affected by their faulty cars. More from the Free Press; In a statement to the Free Press on Wednesday, the company said, “Ford is committed to providing our customers with top-quality vehicles. We continue to deny the allegations in this lawsuit, but rather than continuing with the litigation, Ford entered into a settlement agreement with lawyers representing these plaintiffs. That settlement is fair and appropriate and we look forward to final court approval.” The Ford Focus has frequently been one of the best-selling cars in the world, according to Forbes. Ford has already been penalized globally for its faulty transmissions, setting a precedent for a potential US ruling, the Free Press reports: The company engaged in “unconscionable and misleading or deceptive conduct” and made “false or misleading representations in its response to customer complaints,” according to the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission. It hit Ford with a $10 million fine (about $7.5 million in U.S. dollars) on April 26, 2018, in response to the company’s handling of thousands of complaints between May 2015 and November 2016 — one of the largest fines in Australian history handed down under consumer law. “In most cases, Ford refused to provide a refund or a no-cost replacement vehicle to consumers, even after vehicles had undergone multiple repairs that had not resolved consumers’ complaints,” Rod Sims, commission chairman, said at the time. If you’re wondering where that $4 billion number comes from, it was proposed by Wu in court as the amount that would recompense every owner of a faulty vehicle. He also noted that, in many class-action lawsuits, only three percent of plaintiffs were recompensed—hence his proposed $35 million number. But the difference in this case isn’t just the faulty manufacturing. It’s the possibility that Ford was well aware of the problem and did nothing about it, in fact going out of their way to hide the issues. In cases such as these, companies usually get hit with higher penalties. A conclusive ruling will likely come in December of this year.