Have you been injured by a Los Angeles business’s unfair business practice or practices? Know that you, the innocent consumer, have legal rights. Under California law, a person may bring a lawsuit against any business that engages in any “unlawful, unfair or fraudulent business act or practice” as well as “unfair, deceptive, untrue or misleading advertising” and any act specifically prohibited by another part of the Business and Professions Code (governing prohibitions on advertising). Your consumer rights attorney will work with you to determine whether you have been the victim of an unfair business practice.
California Business & Professions Code section 17200 is often referred to as the “Unfair Competition Law” (“UCL”). The statute allows almost anyone, from private parties to government prosecutors, to bring a suit against a Los Angeles business engaging in certain illegal business practices. As the plaintiff, you may seek restitution or injunctive relief. This means, for example, that if you allege a product you bought has a defect that makes it unsafe or it otherwise does not conform with a law about that product, you would recover the value of your purchase of the product (you would be made whole for the money you spent to buy this defective product). Alternatively, you could seek an injunction (court order) that says the company making the product cannot make it in what you allege is an unsafe or unlawful way.
Your Los Angeles consumer fraud attorney will bring a lawsuit alleging one of three “theories” of wrongdoing: unlawful, unfair, and/or fraudulent. A practice is “unlawful” if it violates some other law. You will satisfy the “unlawful” prong by “borrowing” a violation from another law. A practice is “unfair” if, once the court decides whether the defendant’s action was useful, how that compares with what the victim suffered. California courts have acknowledged that another way to look at what “unfair” means is to apply language of the Federal Trade Commission, which says a practice is unfair if it violates established public policy or is immoral, unethical, oppressive, unscrupulous or substantially injurious to consumers. Finally, a practice is “fraudulent” if members of the public are likely to be conceived by it. As the plaintiff, you can allege that the defendant advertised a product using false or misleading representations.
If you believe you have a claim you can bring under the UCL for unfair business practices, reach out to the aggressive consumer fraud attorneys at BIKLAW today.