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Update:
- A pair of consumers voluntarily dismissed with prejudice claims that LG knowingly sold Kenmore brand refrigerators containing bad parts that cause them to prematurely break down.
- U.S. District Judge Julien Xavier Neals dismissed the class action lawsuit without costs “in favor of or against any party.”
- Court documents did not reveal the reason for the plaintiffs’ decision to dismiss the class action lawsuit.
- The dismissal ended claims LG refused to initiate a recall for the Kenmore refrigerators, despite them allegedly containing defective parts.
- The consumers cited two other complaints where LG chose to settle claims revolving around its Kenmore refrigerators.
(Oct. 19, 2020)
The makers of Kenmore refrigerators face a class action lawsuit from plaintiffs who claim their product is knowingly sold with a defect that leads to breakdowns just years after buying it.
LG installs a specific type of compressor into their Kenmore refrigerators that is made from parts that don’t last, the class action lawsuit alleges, and are eventually fixed with the same parts, which doesn’t solve the initial problem.
Plaintiffs Shannon Marriot and Michael Wasle both bought Kenmore Elite branded refrigerators in 2016. Within three years, they stopped working, according to the filing.
They say LG’s Kenmore refrigerators demonstrate a pattern and history of breakdowns, adding further that “LG’s compressors have caused consumers problems for many years.”
The filing elaborates how defective compressors cause the Kenmore refrigerators to break down. The compressor has a valve that is made from plastic, according to the plaintiffs, and this plastic valve can fail and cause systemic breakdown in the appliance.
They further explain the Kenmore refrigerators also house an evaporator that holds tubing that develops air leaks from pinholes. These leaks “generate excess pressure that stresses the compressor” which in turn contaminates the lubricant in the compressor and “infects the entire sealed system.”
The issues that the plaintiffs had with the compressor persisted, however, even after technicians were dispatched to repair their Kenmore refrigerators, because the problem was with the defective compressor that LG manufactured and installed.
“Even if a repair is performed, [the Kenmore refrigerator] … remains substantially certain to fail within two to three years because LG and its authorized technicians use the same defective parts as replacements,” the plaintiffs said.
Instead of offering refunds, LG “attempted futile repairs or replaced defective compressors with other defective compressors,” according to the lawsuit.
They further point to two class action lawsuits relating to Kenmore refrigerators LG has settled.
Clark v. LG Electronics U.S.A. “placed LG on notice of the defective nature” of its compressors in 2013 by focusing on its Smart Cooling System. Despite settling those claims, the filing says LG continued to sell these Kenmore refrigerators.
Six years later in Bentley v. LG Electronics U.S.A. Inc., Kenmore refrigerators were facing legal action again but have recently reached a proposed settlement.
That settlement, however, does not include the compressors identified in this current class action lawsuit, plaintiffs said.
Beyond previous cases, the plaintiffs in this class action lawsuit further describe the thousands of complaints from customers who bought Kenmore refrigerators and “overwhelmed” repair people called in to fix them.
LG “has had exclusive and direct knowledge of the scale of the compressor problems from its communications with its authorized repair personnel, who have been inundated by repair requests for years,” the filing alleges.
Customers who bought these Kenmore refrigerators expressed feelings of frustration over having to do these repairs so soon after buying them, according to the class action lawsuit, citing an expectation that such appliances have a 13-year average lifespan.
In one online complaint cited in the class action lawsuit, a customer describes how one repairman stayed prepared by keeping spare Kenmore refrigerators compressors in his truck after “he had replaced 7 already in July.”
Plaintiffs further reference extensive media coverage on the defective Kenmore refrigerators, citing five specific stories from network broadcast affiliates from across the country.
News stations from San Diego to Connecticut were airing interviews with frustrated Kenmore refrigerator customers and technicians dealing with faulty compressors.
Kenmore refrigerators “are failing quite pandemically,” a repair person was quoted saying in one of those stories, according to the lawsuit. “It’s a national thing.”
Formally, the plaintiffs are accusing LG and their Kenmore refrigerators of breach of warranty, violations of the Magnuson-Moss Warranty and New Jersey Consumer Fraud acts and fraud by concealment.
Have you purchased a Kenmore refrigerator with an LG compressor? Have you had it replaced or repaired? Let us know in the comments below.
Counsel representing the plaintiffs in the Kenmore refrigerator class action lawsuit is Olimpio Lee Squitieri of Squitieri & Fearon LLP.
The Kenmore refrigerator class action lawsuit is Marriott, et al. v. LG Electronics U.S.A. Inc., Case No. 2:20-cv-14514, in the U.S. District Court for the District of New Jersey.
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195 thoughts onKenmore refrigerator class action over compressor defect dismissed
My 2017 Kenmore Elite refrigerator model no. 795 73167 610 and serial no. 708KR00091 compressor failed and was replaced on 13 June under a new purchase Sears Kenmore warranty. Total cost for parts and labor by Sears installer was $887.91. Cost breakdown: compressor part #TCA38151706 – $0.00 (under warranty); filter dryer part #ADH73150210 – $140.77; valve part #SAV-4 – $18.56; parts tax $13.34; labor $665,24; diagnostic fee $0.00 (waived): clean & maintain labor – $50.00. Also lost over $500 in spoiled food. Request to join lawsuit to cover costs plus damages.
We also bought Kenmore Elite 795.74033.411 paying heft $ in 2016. It died 2017 after 14 months, 2 month out of warranty. We had to pay Sears $310 for repairs. The technician diagnosed the issue to bad compressor, he already had the compressor in his truck!! Now fast forward to couple of years, same issue, our Kenmore Elite has died. We lost so much food both times costing us upwards of $500 dollars each time. Please help recoup our hard earned money lost on this fridge.
We purchased a Kenmore Elite Refrigerator in March of 2021, with a 2 year warranty. In November of 2023, it quit cooling and we lost all of the food in the freezer. Fortunately, I had another refrigerator in the garage and was able to move the refrigerated food out to it. We called to have it repaired (under warranty), right before Thanksgiving. It required a new compressor, along with other parts. We waited for the parts to come in until the end of December (so went through the entire holiday season schlepping in and out of the garage for refrigerated items). Also had to purchase ice the entire time since there was no water hookup in the garage. They came to fix it the end of December. By mid-January, the compressor went out again. I called them out again to service the frig, at which time, they ordered another compressor. It was in stalled February 15th. On March 1st, the refrigerator stopped cooling again, and wouldn’t make ice. I called Sears back again to service the refrigerator, and they are scheduled to come repair it again on March 11th. This is ridiculous for a refrigerator that is less than 3 years old. I need them to replace it with something that won’t break every few months. More than frustrating.
Today is Feb 28, 2024. I await the visit of a repairman. He was just here in August and replaced the Compressor. If it is the Compressor this time this will be the fourth one.
I have purchased a Kenmore refrigerator four years ago and within this last month on the eighth would be a month to date that they have been giving me the runaround telling me that the part is no longer available and that they will replace my refrigerator. Why don’t they just honor their word I am very upset. All my food has gotten bad.
We purchased the kenmore elite frig. in 2018 and the compressor failed in 4 years. Lg would not answer their service phone number. We bought a replacement o.e.m. compressor and paid labor for the installation. A total cost of $800. That compressor failed in less than 1 month. We researched the compressor to find there had been 5 different compressors available to repair it. They had no real solution to the problem. We called an independent repair shop and they put a compressor in it and reprogrammed the circuit board stating the way LG. did it would not last. Another $800 and it was fixed. Our fridge was less than 5 years old and we had to spend $1600 to get rid of LG’s mistake and get it to work. Can anyone help me recover some of my money?
We bought a Kenmore refrigerator on Dec 2019 and it stopped cooling in Jan 2021. We went through a bunch of hoops and they replaced our refrigerator in Apr 2021. This new Kenmore only lasted until June 2023. Once again, it stopped cooling in the refrigerator section. Freezer section still worked fine in both cases, fortunately. Otherwise we would have lost a lot more food.
The ineffectiveness of these lawsuits primarily stems from their failure to target the root cause, which lies in the fundamental DESIGN of the refrigerators rather than in the production processes of specific companies such as LG, Daewoo, Whirlpool, Galanz, Friedrich, Midea, Winix, Electrolux, and Frigidaire. These companies not only manufacture but also supply parts for Kenmore refrigerators.
Issues such as the compressor fan freezing, which blocks cold air flow to the refrigerator’s upper part, or the well publicized pinhole defect, persist irrespective of the manufacturer. This suggests that the problem is likely not confined to a single manufacturer like LG, contrary to what many consumer rights attorneys might argue, but is inherent to the basic DESIGN of the refrigeration units and their components. This is evident from the fact that Kenmore refrigerators, REGARDLESS of their manufacturer throughout different production times, exhibit the same exact issues and in the same approximate time frame (about 2-3 years after manufacture). For instance, I owned a Kenmore French door refrigerator made by Whirlpool (2019) that had the same compressor problem as those made by LG and Daewoo.
Consequently, these lawsuits completely overlook individuals with refrigerators produced by the numerous other manufacturers not listed in the present legal actions, leaving them without recourse? That makes absolutely no sense! Go after Kenmore and the parent company, not LG or Whirlpool.
We purchased a Kenmore Elite Refrigerator model 755 74305.810 on January 14, 2019. The unit failed in May of 2020 at 13 months old. Factory had no sympathy only stating the compressor was covered but not the labor. Qualified tech replaced the compressor but charge us $400.00 labor. It is now January 18 2024 and our technician diagnosed the compressor had failed. He said he had little faith that the compressor was the only problem and said he would need to replace both evaporator coils and the condenser coil and the filter dryer and the three way valve (stepper valve). Guesstimate for parts around $800. -$900. Add labor to that and you would be looking at more than I would want to spend. We really made a bad choice choosing Sears Kenmore Elite Brand. Glad to see class action filed on L G and Sears. 60 months and two compressor failures. Talk about built in obsolesce.
Our Kenmore refrigerator compressor went out about 1 1/2 years ago. It was under warranty because we purchased it in Summer of 2017. We lost hundereds of dollars of food which the repairman said we would be compensated for, but were not. There was no urgency in the repair. Many years ago, I worked for Sears in their service department, and when a compressor went out, Sears would pay for the spoiled food and have the refrigerator repaired ASAP. They would send a compressor via Greyhound bus to arrive for installation the next day. That is when customer service was really customer service.