Workers’ Comp Insurance Suit Won’t Be Class Action

California employers challenging an insurance company’s methods of selling workers’ compensation insurance would be better off suing individually than as a class, a federal court held Jan. 29.

The large number of individual actions is “evidence that a substantial number of putative class members have an interest in controlling their own litigation,” Judge William B. Shubb wrote for the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of California.

The class members would be large companies who paid hundreds of thousands of dollars annually in premiums, meaning their individual damages would be large, the court said.

A class action isn’t superior ...