Does the trial court's denial of class certification of a class action proceed as a result of ATTM's delay in asserting its right to arbitrate?

Affirming the trial court's denial of class certification would eliminate the class members' opportunity to pursue these claims as a class action. Further, ATTM's delay in asserting its right to arbitrate has resulted in the expenditure of considerable costs by plaintiffs and would-be class counsel in litigating this case and conducting discovery. Forcing the named plaintiffs to litigate alone now, and forcing the class to arbitrate individually, would result in those costs being wasted. In short, there is no question that plaintiffs have relied to their detriment on ATTM's failure to assert its right to arbitration in a timely manner. If the trial court's ruling were upheld, ATTM would benefit from its delay in invoking arbitration by making it impractical for the plaintiffs to proceed with the litigation and, ironically, by forcing the erstwhile putative class members to pursue arbitration if they wish to have their dispute heard. The putative class members have up until this point been permitted to rely on the named plaintiffs to press their claims (see Crown v. Parker (1983) 462 U.S. 345, 350), so the named plaintiffs' reliance on ATTM's conduct in failing to assert its right to arbitration in a timely manner would result in prejudice to the entire class if the trial court's ruling were permitted to stand. The purpose of arbitration is to provide a quick, efficient, less expensive form of dispute resolution. Upholding the trial court's ruling would instead reward ATTM for its delay and allow arbitration to occur after plaintiffs have already expended significant monetary and other resources. It would also defeat the goal of class action litigation to provide an opportunity for numerous individual claims involving small amounts of damages to be tried together in an efficient manner.