GEICO Will Pay About $150 to 6,358 People Automatically — No Claim Form — Because It Kept Reporting One Saki Kohama's Accident on Another Saki Kohama's Insurance File

The plaintiff, Saki Kohama of Chula Vista, California, was insured with her husband Ryan Neely through GEICO General Insurance Company. A second couple, Shotaro and Saki Kohama, “who have no relationship to Plaintiff whatsoever,” were insured through GEICO Casualty Company. Per the complaint (¶¶ 36–40), GEICO furnished the second couple's policy information to LexisNexis — including “an at-fault accident involving his wife, Saki Kohama” — in a way that linked it to the plaintiff, even though the two women had “different dates of birth, different driver's license numbers, different addresses” and different vehicles. The plaintiff “has never been associated with an at-fault property damage and/or collision insurance claim with Defendant or any of its affiliates.”

On March 22, 2023 LexisNexis published a C.L.U.E. report about her to an insurer that was pricing her policy. The insurer “quoted Plaintiff much higher premiums,” and she ended up buying coverage elsewhere “at rates several hundred dollars a year higher” (¶¶ 44–45). She disputed through LexisNexis, which under the FCRA must forward the dispute to the furnisher. The paper trail the complaint quotes: April 19, 2023, LexisNexis calls the record “unverifiable” but keeps it, source “GOVERNMENT EMPLOYEES INS CO (GEICO)”; May 26, 2023, after a second dispute, the same record is now “accurate”; June 8, 2023, a GEICO Casualty representative writes to her directly that “you, Saki Kohama, were not the driver involved in this loss”; August 16, 2023, after a third dispute, LexisNexis again: “unverifiable”; August 30, 2023, GEICO Casualty by email: “You were added to this claim by mistaken identity due to having the same name as our insured driver.” The complaint's point is that none of those admissions reached LexisNexis, and the record was never marked disputed (¶¶ 50, 55, 58, 63). GEICO “denied and continues to deny the allegations,” and the court has decided nothing on the merits.

The class definition in the July 7 order is unusually specific, and every one of its eight conditions has to be true. You must have (i) filed one or more disputes through LexisNexis Risk Solutions between March 13, 2022 and May 1, 2026; (ii) disputed information “incorrectly linked to their C.L.U.E. report or reflected a mixed file (i.e., the disputed information did not belong to them)”; (iii) disputed information that was not attributable to anyone in your household; (iv) received a LexisNexis response naming GEICO as the source; (v) received a response calling the information “unverifiable” or “accurate”; (vi) disputed information GEICO did not tell LexisNexis to correct or remove; (vii) disputed information that remained on your C.L.U.E. report; and (viii) appear on “the Settlement Class List generated by Defendant.” The start date is not arbitrary: the complaint was filed March 13, 2024, and the class reaches back exactly two years — the FCRA's basic limitations period (15 U.S.C. § 1681p).

The court found the class “contains 6,358 individuals” (order ¶ 4). That is smaller than the “approximately 7,200” some settlement aggregators report; we use the court's number. Because membership is defined by GEICO's own dispute records, there is no way to join by filing — either you are on the list and received an email or postcard from Continental DataLogix, or you are not. The settlement website says someone who believes they qualify but received no notice should contact the administrator. What you give up if you stay in: FCRA and California CCRAA claims against GEICO arising from these facts. What you keep, expressly: “Settlement Class Members' ability to bring separate claims against LexisNexis are preserved” (motion, § III.B).

GEICO pays the $1,650,000 in two checks: a $65,000 Administration Fund within ten days of preliminary approval, and a $1,585,000 Benefits Fund within ten days of the Effective Date (agreement § VIII.1). Out of the Benefits Fund come class counsel's fee request of $549,945 — exactly one-third of the total — up to $10,000 in litigation costs, and a $10,000 service award for Ms. Kohama. That leaves $1,015,055. Divided by 6,358 people it is $159.65 each if every check is delivered and cashed; the notice's “approximately $150” is a rounded estimate, and the actual number moves with the court's fee ruling, the number of undeliverable notices and the interest the escrow earns. For scale: the FCRA's statutory damages for a willful violation run from $100 to $1,000 per consumer (15 U.S.C. § 1681n), so the automatic payment sits at the bottom of that band without anyone having to prove willfulness.

The payment plan (agreement § IX): the administrator issues automatic payments within 20 days of the Effective Date, by paper check to the address on the class list or by the electronic method you elect on the website with the Notice ID and PIN from your notice. Checks are void after 60 days. If, 30 days after the last void date, at least $100,000 remains, everyone who cashed a first check gets a second distribution — provided it works out to at least $10 a head after the cost of sending it. Anything left after that goes to Maryland Legal Aid, the 501(c)(3) the plaintiff selected under a clause that bars picking “an organization funding the plaintiffs' bar.” “No portion of the Common Fund shall revert to Defendant under any circumstances” (§ VIII.3).

Three deadlines, all set by the order as day-counts from July 7. October 20, 2026 (105 days): requests for exclusion, postmarked, mailed to Kohama v. GEICO Settlement, c/o Settlement Administrator, P.O. Box 16, West Point, PA 19486, with your name, address, phone number and a sentence to the effect of “I request to be excluded from the Settlement Class in the matter of Kohama v. GEICO.” Opting out forfeits the payment and the right to object. October 31, 2026 (116 days): objections, mailed to the same box, with five required elements including a list of every class action objection you or your lawyer have filed in the past five years. Class counsel's fee motion is due ten days before that and will be posted on the settlement site October 21. January 14, 2027: the digital-payment election closes on the website, and at 2:30 p.m. Judge Chuang holds the final approval hearing in Courtroom 2B, 6500 Cherrywood Lane, Greenbelt. Nobody has to attend.

Money follows the Effective Date, which the agreement defines as seven days after the final approval order if no one objects, and 35 days after final judgment if anyone does and nobody appeals. With no objections, the sequence is January 14 hearing → order → Effective Date around January 21 → GEICO funds the $1,585,000 within ten days → automatic payments within 20 days of the Effective Date, so roughly mid-February 2027 at the earliest. One objection and an appeal push everything past the appeal. The case took a slow road here: complaint March 13, 2024; GEICO's answer November 4, 2024; document discovery, interrogatories and four depositions; a stay for JAMS mediation before retired Judge William G. Connelly; a settlement in principle reported to the court February 27, 2026; the signed agreement June 18; the motion June 22; the order July 7; notices September 1. Class counsel are Francis Mailman Soumilas of Philadelphia and the Law Office of Courtney Weiner in Washington; the settlement site is Kohama2026Settlement.com, phone (833) 215-9289.