Volkswagen Musterfeststellungsklage und Vergleich

What happens next?

On Friday, Volkswagen broke off talks on an out-of-court settlement with the Federal Association of Consumer Organizations (VZBV), which Rogert and Ulbrich represent as lawyers in the model declaratory action. The negotiations with the VZBV failed "because Volkswagen has not been prepared to provide transparency and security measures so far," explained VZBV board member Klaus Müller in a press conference called at short notice. On this page, affected diesel drivers can find all the information on the open questions surrounding the model declaratory action and the VW settlement. Read the press release of the VZBV.

What exactly happened?

Although a settlement was within reach, Volkswagen had the settlement negotiations with the vzbv declared a failure via the press on Friday and announced that it wanted to make a settlement offer itself. The VZBV commented on this as follows:

After almost five years diesel scandal It is of course good news that Volkswagen is willing to make payments in Germany as well. In the settlement negotiations, Volkswagen was not prepared to compensate all of the defrauded customers. If VW is now really concerned about fairness, the group should make an offer to all those affected and not just those who are on the register of claims for the model declaratory action. However, no details of the offer are yet known. Therefore, all affected customers who now receive a settlement from VW should examine it very carefully.

The VZBV is irritated by the way in which VW’s talks were broken off and by VW’s negotiating style, as the Handelsblatt in an interview with Klaus Müller reported.

How high is the alleged VW comparison?

First of all, it must be made clear that the vzbv is opposed to the public presentation of Volkswagen contradicts that there was an “already negotiated settlement”. Most recently, a compensation sum of around 15 percent of the purchase price and a correction clause have been discussed. Given the number of people registered in the model declaratory action, this results in a compensation amounting to around 830 million eurosIn addition, when processing the compensation, it is important to keep the overall package in mind in order to ensure transparency and "to make sure that the money reaches the consumers in the agreed amount," according to the VZBV.

What happens if I accept VW's offer?

If you accept VW's direct compensation offer, you do not need to do anything else as part of the model declaratory action. You will take care of the formalities directly with VW - we, the lawyers at VZBV, can then do nothing more for you. You do not need to be removed from the register of claims for the VW model declaratory action. However, if a positive declaratory judgment is reached as part of the class action, the individual settlement offered by VW should mean that you cannot claim damages from VW again individually. Please check carefully whether you really want to accept the VW offer.

What happens if I do not accept VW's offer?

It's very simple: the model declaratory action is continuing - with the possibility of claiming significantly higher sums for diesel drivers, although these must be claimed individually following the ruling. This means that all consumers who have registered in the register of claims and do not accept VW's offer are still bound by the outcome of the model declaratory action. The fact that VW has broken off talks on an out-of-court settlement does not change this.

What happens now with the model declaratory action?

The Higher Regional Court in Braunschweig will set a new date - and the lawyers at Rogert & Ulbrich will continue to do everything they can to obtain the best possible verdict for the affected VW customers in court. The trend in case law in the VW emissions scandal gives great cause for hope. In May, a ruling from the Federal Court of Justice is also expected that will overturn the previous regulation on "compensation for use". The Rogert & Ulbrich law firm recently achieved another groundbreaking ruling on this. This is not least why the Volkswagen Group is trying to settle as many cases as possible that could benefit from such a Federal Court of Justice ruling in advance through a "direct settlement".