A class action was brought against Lloyds Bank regarding the issuance of certain dual currency, or International Mortgage System (“IMS”), loans.  The U.S. District Court in Hawaii certified a class, and the U.S. Ninth Circuit denying Lloyds’ Rule 23(f) petition.

Lloyds then filed a Motion to Compel Trial Plan “illustrating the expected course of proceedings at trial and showing that the requirements for maintaining this case as a class action under Rule 23 are met.”  This motion was denied.

“This case involves only two claims and no subclasses, and proof of liability and damages is straightforward and achievable through common evidence. In other words, this case does not involve the level of complexity that required the district court in Espenscheid to call for a trial plan at a later stage in the proceedings, after the class had been certified. Here, the Court has determined that the class members have loans with the same interest rate definition; that Lloyds calculated the Cost of Funds in the same manner for all class members; and that no issue exists with regard to what oral representations Lloyds may have made to individual borrowers regarding the loan documents.  The Court has also found that ‘the key legal issue’ – whether Lloyds permissibly passed on the ‘liquidity transfer pricing’ (LTP) charge to borrowers by including it in the Cost of Funds – is common to all class members.  Thus, the Court can identify no problems with individualized proof that would require a trial plan at this stage in the litigation.”

 

Wilcox v. Lloyds TSB Bank, No.13-00508, 2016 WL 4374943 (D.Haw. Aug. 15, 2016).