Owners of 2016 through 2019 Hyundai Sonata plug-in hybrids who sat without a car while a high-voltage battery repair dragged on could collect $10 a day under a proposed class settlement. The payment can rise to $15 a day if total claims come in below $250,000, and the claims deadline is Dec. 28.
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Hyundai Motor America has not admitted wrongdoing, and the deal has only preliminary court approval so far. Payment is not automatic: an owner has to file a claim with repair records.
Who qualifies for the days-down payment
The settlement site for Kline et al. v. Hyundai Motor America, Inc., Case No. 23-cv-00245 in the U.S. District Court for the District of Maryland, defines the class as owners or lessees of a 2016-2019 Sonata Plug-In Hybrid that needed a high-voltage battery replacement during the warranty period and could not be fixed within 60 days. For most class members, the relevant stretch falls between late 2021 and summer 2023. Coverage takes the form of a “Days Down Payment,” which pays for each qualifying day a car waited. Autoblog’s report and ClassAction.org agree on the 60-day floor, the $10 rate and the $15 ceiling that applies only if submitted claims total under $250,000. Days are counted from Hyundai’s records, according to ClassAction.org.
The lifetime battery warranty behind the lawsuit
The case began on Jan. 30, 2023, when Samuel and Lauren Kline of Maryland sued after the battery in their 2017 Sonata Plug-in Hybrid failed in December 2021. Top Class Actions’ summary of the complaint says the Klines’ dealer had held the car for more than 13 months waiting for a replacement battery, and that Hyundai had “abandoned all those customers” after dropping the model. The complaint rested on a lifetime battery warranty. As CarComplaints.com reported, the warranty text covers the original retail purchaser for as long as that person owns the car, and the plaintiffs said Hyundai used the promise to sell the vehicles while lacking the parts and inventory to honor it. Their counsel were Goldman & Minton, P.C., and Lewis & Tompkins, P.C. The battery at issue is a 9.8 kWh lithium-ion polymer pack. The plaintiffs also said Hyundai’s buyback offers undervalued the cars and that the company ended the model after 2020, which they blamed for the parts shortage.
The original proposed class was narrower than the settlement class. The complaint described buyers and lessees in eight states: California, Connecticut, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, New Jersey, New York and Oregon. ClassAction.org says the settlement reaches owners and lessees in the United States and the District of Columbia, excluding territories. The history is long, too. The Klines filed in January 2023, and preliminary approval came on July 31, 2026, more than three years later, so owners who waited out a repair years ago are being asked to reconstruct dates from service paperwork.
Deadlines, the fund and the final hearing
A federal court in Maryland granted preliminary approval, which ClassAction.org dates to July 31. The same report puts the total fund at up to $1.43 million and says benefits begin only after final approval and any appeals. It places the final approval hearing on Dec. 21, one week before the claim cutoff. The settlement site itself is less tidy. It lists two different dates for the final hearing and two for the exclusion deadline, and it asks visitors not to contact the court clerk. Class counsel Thomas J. Minton of Goldman & Minton lists a phone line at (410) 783-7575 for questions, and the administrator’s information line is 1-866-964-4271.
Autoblog advises owners to gather repair records showing when the car was taken out of service and when the battery repair was finished, since the claim form needs those dates. A VIN lookup on the site confirms whether a car is in the class. Claims can be filed online or by mail, and a postmark by Dec. 28 counts. Benefits start only after final approval and any appeals, so the Dec. 28 claim deadline and the day money arrives are separate milestones. Owners who do nothing are bound by the settlement and give up the right to sue separately, while those who want out had to opt out before the exclusion deadline.
Whether $10 a day matters depends on the wait. A car idle for the minimum 60 days would be worth $600 at the base rate or $900 at $15, and some of these cars waited far longer. The arithmetic is easy to run. At $10 a day, a $1.43 million fund would cover 143,000 vehicle-days, the equivalent of about 2,380 cars idle for the 60-day minimum, and a claims total under $250,000 would amount to fewer than 25,000 days at the base rate. The open question is the final tally: with a fund of up to $1.43 million, the daily rate holds at $10 unless total claims fall short of $250,000.
This article was produced with the assistance of AI and reviewed by Morning Overview editors prior to publication.
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