Insurance broker Jardine Lloyd Thompson is facing a second class action on behalf of local councils claiming it charged inflated premiums.
The Australian Competition and Consumer Commission has taken private health insurer Medibank to court for falsely telling consumers they were not eligible for certain coverage under their insurance policies, with over 800 policy holders denied coverage for joint investigation or reconstruction procedures.
Radio Rentals and its insurer, AIG, have reached a $29 million settlement in a consumer class action alleging the company pushed misleading ‘Rent, Try, $1 Buy’ leases onto vulnerable customers.
Billionaire Lindsay Fox and property magnate Max Beck have lost a dispute over the valuation of land at their jointly operated Essendon Airport, with a judge siding with the Federal Government’s method that calculated the site’s value at $349 million, not $7.1 million as claimed by their expert.
A Credit Suisse unit has lost a bid to strike out portions of a case launched by a group of investors over financial products known as MINI warrants, with a judge saying the claims were not untenable as argued.
Insurance company Watchstone Group, which is facing a lawsuit by Slater & Gordon UK over a botched acquisition that brought the law firm to its knees, has secured approval to file a counterclaim alleging auditor PricewaterhouseCoopers engaged in “secret meetings” with the firm’s corporate finance adviser to gain leverage leading up to the deal.
Crown Resorts has been given the greenlight to challenge a court order allowing former employees to talk to lawyers for a class action over its business in China, but the class has another chance to make its case that the ruling should stand.
In a year in which it settled a shareholder class action against itself and purchased a class action boutique, publicly-traded law firm Shine Lawyers has posted a profit of $14 million, down more than 26 percent from last year’s $19 million.
Law firm Holding Redlich has defended national managing partner Ian Robertson against allegations by NSW Labor Party general secretary Kaila Murnain that the lawyer advised her to keep quiet about a $100,000 illegal political donation.
Concerns about duplicative costs in multiple class actions are better addressed by case management decisions aimed at cutting excessive expense, not by limiting the amount lawyers representing group members can spend, the Full Federal Court has said in dismissing an appeal by baby food maker Bellamy’s.