In Two Jinn, Inc. v. Government Payment Service, Inc., ___ Cal.App.4th ___ (Feb. 2, 2015), the Court of Appeal (First Appellate District, Division Four) addressed Prop. 64 standing in the context of a UCL competitor action, and affirmed the trial court's grant of summary judgment in the defendant's favor.
The plaintiff (Aladdin Bail Bonds) advanced a couple of standing arguments, each of which the Court rejected.
Aladdin contends that GPS's allegedly unfair business practices caused it economic injury when customers who would otherwise have used Aladdin's services used GPS's services instead. We disagree because the summary judgment evidence shows that any diversion of customers from Aladdin to GPS did not result from the fact that GPS does not have a bail bond license, or that it does not comply with other regulations governing the activities of licensed bail bond agents.
Slip op. at 9.
Alternatively, Aladdin contends it has standing because it suffered an economic injury by incurring “significant costs and expenses” to investigate the “nature, scope and extent of Defendant's conduct.” .... Aladdin paid money to hire outside counsel, obtain copies of GPS's contracts, and to determine which California counties were involved with GPS's allegedly unlawful activities ... [and] incurred expenses by diverting staff to investigate GPS's activities. ....These “pre-litigation” costs do not establish standing to bring a UCL claim because they are not an economic injury caused by the business practices that Aladdin characterizes as unlawful. Rather, as Pinney's declaration confirms, the reason Aladdin incurred pre-litigation expenses was to generate evidence. Aladdin then used that evidence to support this lawsuit. “Plaintiffs cannot establish standing to pursue a UCL claim based on expenses incurred in order to bring their UCL claim. If they could, the requirement that individuals show they lost money or property ‘as a result’ of the challenged practice in order to have standing to sue under the UCL would be meaningless. [Citation.]” (Robinson v. HSBC Bank USA (N.D.Cal.2010) 732 F.Supp.2d 976, 989.)
Slip op. at 12-13.
This part of the opinion stands in contrast to Glen Oaks Estates Homeowners Assn. v. Re/Max Premier Properties, Inc., 203 Cal.App.4th 913 (2012) (discussed in this blog post), which held that investigative costs are sufficient "injury in fact" to confer standing under Kwikset.
The opinion then goes on to hold that, even if the plaintiff did have standing, the defendant's conduct was neither "unlawful" nor "unfair" within the meaning of the UCL. Slip op. at 15-24.
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