scuse me i'm steve larson i represent plaintiff julie willis a plaintiff williston's appealing the district court's decision granting summary judgment against her in her favor of state farm mutual and state farm five i first like to address the issue as to state farm mutual we believe the court erred in ruling in favor of state farm mutuals as a matter of law because the court construed the words applied for in the fair credit reporting act in favor of the defendant construe the language of the statute in favor of the consumer it is plain that the district court here let me first explain how these entities work state farm mutual is the operating it is the one that employs all the employees owns a computer system that stores where a person is placed and besides being the operating company get also is an insurance company that provides of the insurance that everybody wants because it's the least expensive state farm fire on the other hand is just a recipient of these policies it doesn't underwrite them it doesn't handle the claims for them it just perceives the policies and state farm fire just as your standard policy is not the preferred not as good now i think it's important about who is really operating company here because we believe that's who takes the adverse action they own the computer system they do the underwriting to set the rates they employ all the employees and most significantly we think is that they are the entity that contract with choice point you may have heard recently about choice point releasing information about a number of individuals private information they are an entity that provides credit information and state farm mutual had a contract with choice now one plaintiff will it wanted insurance she walked into a state farm agent's office and asked for the best available insurance policy and assistan and i think that the main issue in this case is whether it was applied for but i think that took also comes into play because it is whether state farm mutual took an adverse action by we think it took an adverse action in respects by placing the consumer in the less desirable company the state farm fire and casualty the standard company and secondly because it denied insurance to them as well as  denial of credit apply or denial of insurance apply for there is no issue in court company if insurance is denied in here state farm mutual denied coverage to miss be placed and they farm fire in casualty because she had a speeding ticket but that person didn't really know because what makes the determination is the computer system and all these insurance companies use acronyms for their computer systems here in the state farm case it is called a new agent underwriting information everything is done automatically on this computer the agent's assistant puts the information into the u i computer and then a u i computer automatically pulls a credit report pulls a motor vehicle driving records pulls all this information sorts it all together and spits out where this person gets placed the agent or the agent's assistant doesn't even see the underwriter i need to point something out a credit score might be something we all understand as something used when we want to go borrow money or something like that in credit agencies to issue credit scores insurance scores each of these companies have their own proprietary way of calculating and insurance score some call it an underwriting score and that's why so much of the information is filed under seal in this case because it's proprietary but an insurance score or an underwriting score whatever the insurance companies use is still soley with respect to credit now when ms willis went into the into the agent's office they ran her credit score and she did not have a credit happened yes we believe from the consumer's perspective we believe the application was an ongoing process and we think that was when the decision was made and it said and it's important here because the consumer considered placing her in both companies and that and the computer would have said if she had a score of about seven twenty five all kate to bind in neutral so obviously there must have been an application to state farm mutual  decision with respect to these very we have a that goes to the different entities the state farm mutual took an adverse action we think because it placed his will us into state farm fire and casualty which had higher rates than state farm mutual and we think it took an adverse action because it denied her coverage so with heirs to  basis for for that reason as to state farm fire i'm not going to address that other than just to say the court just ruled that based on her initial application there was no claim against state farm fire and  what that means is that it kind of comes to the absurd result that mr wallace was charged more because of her credit score but nobody has an obligation to tell her that and so  we could charge her you know that's just how our rate structure is set up but what really is you have first action here is state farm mutual put her it's a lot of her into an inferior company and even if that's the best r that she was offered yesterday if it's ultimately ultimately it would not have mattered if she had a high enough credit score because if you have a credit score above seven twenty five the insurance but the judge equated applied for with a written application to the district court thought it was very significant that there was a written application with state farm fires name on the top that an agent's assistant had  credit score by fire and kept state farm fire casualty and it was exactly the same rate in the same terms so that when the agent of the insurance companies said quoted of separate state farm companies in this case they have sued both state farm fire and casualty saying that there was a better better terms of insurance or lower lower rate of insurance available to her and that state farm fire and casualty took adverse action under the fair credit act by not offering her better terms of coverage or a lower price there's no evidence in said there are underwrite there underwriters for both fire casualty and mutual and as i believe mr hauser addressed earlier often times someone may drop a check but will be acting as an agent for various companies within the state farm group of companies for purposes of drafting so who moves of this is to the higher great company the decision was made when they under the general does what they call field underwriting and in the field underwriting process the agent asks a series of questions related to which which are cute into the various underwriting guidelines for the two companies underwriting guidelines in that quoting program which is separate from any consumer report no consumer report whatsoever when the agent is listening to the answers that you're giving i'm taking them into a program use tell me you have an auto accident within three years the state farm fire and casualties underwriting guidelines state that person may be eligible for a state farm fire and casualty policy and the complete and once once i once you tell me that you've had an auto accident within three years under the guidelines the only thing the only quote that the agent can prepare is a to the general are underwriting guidelines and the question was asked early in the proceedings was what happens if there is a no here or a the agent doesn't go to the computer system to get a consumer report the general auto underwriting guidelines for state farm fire and casualty and the general auto underwriting guidelines for mutual would apply the person in this case ms well as well as never eligible under those general auto underwriting guidelines for a mutual policy but i considered she has applied she has indicated based on the quote which is not based on her consumer report that she wishes to apply for the insurance quote at the agency then prepares a quote it goes to and in that process then there is an application made for the insurance quote it in the instance of someone who says i just want insurance from state farm the consumer may not recognize that there are different companies but for purposes them to put the agent still maintains field underwriting authority and is not bound by that instruction but it is that it's basically an authorization to grant an exception in that in the favor of that of the it's an offer from space farm buyer casually in this instance and then when the agent runs her number runs to the computer system to get a consumer report if additional information is received that sa she's not eligible for let's say for example she doesn't disclose to her her driving accident and they prepare an application for mutual they run the system and discover yes there was a driving accident or an accident then a letter would be i vicar notice would go out under those instances well what the plaintiffs are arguing here is that when the application goes and any of any affiliated company with the company that well i guess we don't see that as a problem we see that as an opportunity well i think it's an instance where the insurance mutual company has not taken any action whatsoever it does not that your rate doesn't doesn't trigger any action by denying you insurance that you otherwise would be eligible for purposes we don't consider it a formal case which is not necessarily what directs the person to one company or the other and where there is information that the fair credit act makes an exception where the information that results in someone being swatted is or is it is based on a transaction or insurance then every insurance company that maybe and within the group of insurance companies is responsible to issue their credit notice because it under the  saying that the minute i walk through the door and say i want to sharon's that any better insurance that might be available because there might be a very there might be an exception granted by one or ten or one hundred other companies that you happen to be