Phan v. Transamerica Premier Life Insurance Company

Background

Dung Phan sued Transamerica Premier Life Insurance Company on behalf of herself and a proposed class. She alleges that, on or after January 1, 2013, Transamerica systematically failed to comply with California Insurance Code sections 10113.71 and 10113.72, which concern notice and grace-period requirements for insurance policies.

The parties had agreed that Transamerica would produce specified information about responsive insurance policies in response to Interrogatories 17, 19, and 20 and Request for Production 34. They disputed whether Transamerica also had to provide contact information for the owners of those policies and for beneficiaries when the insured had died. Phan said the information was needed to develop evidence concerning the requirements for class certification and to address Transamerica’s anticipated argument that the reasons for policy lapse or termination required individualized determinations. Transamerica argued that Phan had not shown that the proposed class met the class-certification requirements or that the discovery would support her class allegations.

Court’s analysis

The court explained that district courts have broad discretion over discovery before a class is certified. It stated that a plaintiff does not have to prove in advance that the class-certification requirements are met, or that the requested discovery is likely to substantiate the class allegations, to obtain contact information for potential class members. Those considerations may still be weighed, along with whether the discovery is relevant and proportional to the needs of the case.

The court found that Phan’s plausible allegations—including allegations about Transamerica’s standardized policies and procedures—and Transamerica’s anticipated defenses were enough to justify pre-certification discovery, as long as the discovery was not unduly burdensome. The court understood that Transamerica could query electronic records for policy owners’ contact information. By contrast, Transamerica did not maintain the beneficiaries’ contact information in the same way when an insured had died; obtaining it would require a manual records search. Transamerica was determining how many policies were involved and expected to complete that review by October 31, 2022.

Ruling and required next steps

The court ordered Transamerica to produce, as soon as practicable, contact information for putative class members who owned relevant insurance policies responsive to the identified discovery requests. The order made production subject to resolving disputes about procedures governing the production and use of the information.

The court deferred deciding whether Transamerica must produce contact information for beneficiaries of responsive policies where the insured had died. By November 4, 2022, the parties had to submit the number of those policies and an estimate of the time and effort needed to produce the beneficiaries’ contact information. The parties also had to confer about privacy protections and procedures for producing and using the information, then submit their positions or a proposed agreement by November 11, 2022. Judge Virginia K. DeMarchi issued the order.