CNH Industrial America LLC appealed a lawsuit against it from the Western District of Pennsylvania to the Third Circuit Court of Appeals on Thursday. The plaintiff in the lawsuit, Douglas Bieda, filed an implied warranty claim purporting that he had purchased a defective CNH crop planter causing him to have a diminished crop yield.
The Notice of Appeal reported that CNH was appealing the court’s decision to deny its Motion for Summary Judgment which was entered on February 9. In the Opinion, signed by Judge Maureen P. Kelly, the court ruled that “CNH’s disclaimer of implied warranty is procedurally and substantively unconscionable.”
The order explained “undisputed facts” including that the plaintiff, Bieda, and his wife had purchased the CNH 2018 Case IH 2150 12 Row 30 Planter in January 2018 with a 22 gpm PTO pump, a hydraulic down force attachment, and a hydraulic wing down force attachment from a CNH dealer. This purchase, which totalled $168,000, was to use with the CNH tractor already owned by the plaintiff. The machine was set up by the plaintiff and confirmed, as agreed in the sales contract, by a technician from L&W where the machine was purchased.
Bieda and the technician were both reportedly not aware that CNH had determined the pump purchased by the plaintiff “could not provide sufficient hydraulic pressure to operate the Planter successfully” and had developed a Hydraulic Completing Kit to fix the issue. Judge Kelly said that “the evidence is undisputed that CNH failed to take steps to separately advise dealers (or purchasers) of the malfunction or the need to add a Hydraulic Completing Kit with each Planter sale.”
After multiple calls from the plaintiff to the technician, the technician was able to find what was missing, but did not get the part to Bieda until after the planting season was over, causing the plaintiff an estimated $250,000 in losses because “his 2018 corn crop was not planted at a sufficient depth.” He further claimed that issues with the planter missing parts during the 2019 growing season led to additional losses.
According to the Order, CNH claimed that it was entitled to summary judgment because it “validly and conspicuously disclaimed all implied warranties in its sales documents and … because Bieda failed to provide notice to CNH of his ‘issues with the equipment.’” The court denied these arguments, saying that they were unconscionable and that Bieda had given notice eight months before filing the complaint.
CNH is represented by Littleton Park Joyce Ughetta & Kelly LLP. Bieda is represented by Thompson Law Group.
