Sanyo Solar Panel Delamination Settlement

Who Is Eligible?

You may be eligible to file a claim if you:

• There are two subclasses. The first is everyone in the United States who purchased and installed Sanyo-brand solar panels from the HIP-xxxBA2, BA3 or BA5 model series for residential use. The second is anyone who later bought a home, building or ground-mounted system with those panels already on it.
• That second subclass is easy to miss. You did not have to buy the panels yourself. Buying a house with them on the roof puts you in.
• Residential use is the boundary. A commercial installation of the same panels is not what this covers.
• Model series decides everything, and two are named as outside it. HIP-xxxDA3 and HIP-xxxBA19 panels are expressly not in the settlement. Their owners are pointed to the ordinary limited warranty process instead, which FAQ 27 on the administrator's site explains.
• The damage has to be delamination that meets visual criteria. The administrator publishes two reference documents, one showing panels with qualifying damage and one showing panels without, and reading both before you photograph anything will tell you quickly whether you have a claim.
• This route is now the only route for delamination. The settlement replaced whatever warranty procedure previously applied to these models for delamination claims, so going to Panasonic directly about it will send you back here.
• Excluded are anyone who opted out, the defendants and entities they control, their legal representatives, heirs and successors, settlement class counsel and their immediate families, and any judge assigned to the case along with their immediate families.
• Nothing here touches fire. The release expressly leaves out claims for personal injury and property damage related to fires, and claims against anyone other than the released parties.

How Much Can You Get?

Two remedies exist and the claimant does not pick between them. An independent claim administrator decides whether your panels show qualifying damage, and if they do, the defendants choose whether you get replacement panels or a prorated cash refund. The refund is prorated by how much useful life the panel had left, which is the whole calculation, and it means a panel bought in 2006 is worth far less than the same panel bought in 2012.

The $700 on this page was never a payout. It was the purchase price the court assumed for one panel when estimating what the settlement was worth, and in that same illustration a panel with half its useful life left produced a refund of $350.

Per panel is the unit, which cuts both ways. The court's estimate assumed roughly 136,066 Sanyo settlement panels in total and a 15% damage rate. A household with twenty qualifying panels is in a very different position from one with two, and on a large array the total can run well past $700.

No fund, no cap.

The court described this as a claims-made settlement with no common fund, so your payment does not shrink because other people filed. That is the opposite of how most settlements on this site work, and it is the single most favorable thing about this one. Class counsel were separately awarded $1,672,265.03 in fees and $72,734.97 in costs, measured against a lodestar of $2,174,969.

Timing runs against you twice. Every month reduces the remaining useful life the refund is based on, and it moves you closer to the twenty-year cutoff.

How to File Your Claim

File with the administrator:

• Work out your own deadline first. Twenty years from your original purchase date, or 31 December 2029, whichever comes sooner. The administrator states plainly that if the period has expired you are not eligible, so this is the step that decides whether the rest is worth doing.
• Find the model number on the panel label. You need HIP-xxxBA2, BA3 or BA5. DA3 and BA19 are different series and are not in this settlement.
• Look at the two example documents before you photograph anything. The administrator publishes one file showing panels with qualifying damage and another showing panels without it, and comparing your own panels against both will save you a rejected claim.
• Then assemble three things: the completed claim form, photographs, and proof that you own the panels. The claim form is downloadable from sanyosolarclaims.com and its instructions set out exactly which photographs and which ownership documents are wanted.
• Send it by email or by post. Email goes to sanyosolarclaims@4class.com. Post goes to Ziccarello v Sanyo Energy (U.S.A.) Corp. Claims, Class Litigation Administration Support Services, PO Box 1272, Lancaster, California 93584.
• If your panels are DA3 or BA19, or your problem is power output rather than delamination, you are in the ordinary warranty system instead. That now runs through Panasonic, at its solar warranty page or by email to PanasonicHIT@us.panasonic.com, because the Sanyo companies were absorbed into Panasonic in 2015 and no longer process warranty claims.
• The settlement hotline is 1-844-702-2787 and it is free to call.

Frequently Asked Questions