Davis

Plaintiff and appellant Robert Davis (Davis) appeals a judgment of dismissal following the sustaining without leave to amend of a demurrer interposed by defendant and appellant Ford Motor Credit Company LLC (Ford) to Davis’s original complaint.

Ford also appeals, seeking review of a postjudgment order denying its motion for attorney fees.

This litigation relates to Ford’s billing practices under a retail installment sales contract. Ford’s practice is to apply a customer’s payment to an earlier missed installment, rather than to the current month’s installment. As a result, the current month’s installment is unpaid, triggering a new late fee for the current month. Davis’s theory is that these successive late fees are prohibited by the Rees-Levering Motor Vehicle Sales and Finance Act (Rees-Levering) (Civ. Code, §§ 2981 et seq., 2982, subd. (k)), and are actionable under the unfair competition law (UCL) (Bus. & Prof. Code, § 17200 et seq.) (hereafter, section 17200) and under the Consumers Legal Remedies Act (CLRA) (Civ. Code, §§ 1750 et seq., 1770, subd. (a)(14)).

We conclude the alleged conduct of Ford in charging successive late fees for successive late payments does…