California Supreme Court allows "continuous accrual" doctrine to avoid statute of limitations for "unfair" UCL claim

Larry Golub of Barger & Wollen, LLP, writes for lexology.com:

"Seeking to clarify the extent to which the four-year statute of limitations applies to claims under the Unfair Competition Law, Business & Professions Code section 17200 et seq. (the 'UCL'), a unanimous California Supreme Court today issued its decision in Aryeh v. Canon Business Solutions, Inc., allowing at least a portion of the plaintiff’s UCL claim to proceed beyond demurrer.

Relying on the continuous accrual doctrine, the Court explained that this equitable exception to the usual rules governing limitations periods would permit the plaintiff to pursue:

'at least some [alleged unfair] acts within the four years preceding suit, [and thus] the suit is not entirely time-barred.'

Background

The plaintiff ran a copying business and entered into two agreements with Canon (one in November 2001 and one in February 2002) to lease copiers. The agreements required the plaintiff to pay monthly rent for each copier, subject to a maximum copy allowance. If plaintiff exceeded the monthly allowance, he had to pay an additional per copy charge. The agreements also provided that Canon would service the copiers.

Beginning in 2002, plaintiff noticed discrepancies between meter readings taken by Canon employees and the actual number of copies made on each copier, and he began compiling independent records. Plaintiff alleged that Canon employees had run thousands of test copies during 17 service visits between February 2002 and November 2004, which he claimed resulted in him exceeding his monthly allowances and having to pay" ... [read more at lexology.com]