Cascade Auto Glass pleads guilty to attempted fraud

A Vancouver auto glass company will pay penalties totaling $1,700 after pleading guilty to a charge of attempted insurance fraud.

Cascade Auto Glass charged insurers more for repairs billed from a non-existent office, according to Rich Roesler, a spokesman for the state Office of the Insurance Commissioner. The insurance commissioner’s office prosecuted the case on May 12 in Clark County Superior Court.

Cascade Auto Glass, as a corporation, pleaded guilty to a charge of attempted insurance fraud, a gross misdemeanor, Roesler said. The company will pay a $1,000 fine, a $500 victim penalty assessment and $200 in court costs. Roesler said the case and the penalties involved were not unusual. “In the grand scheme of things, we’ve seen much more significant cases,” he said.

Cascade Auto Glass could not be reached for comment Monday.

The state insurance commissioner’s office found multiple cases of overbilling by the company. Some insurance companies pay auto glass claims at different rates, depending on where the shop is located, Roesler said. For example, rural windshield replacements are typically paid at a higher rate because transportation costs are higher in rural areas than in urban locations.

The investigation found that Cascade Auto Glass, which offers a mobile windshield replacement service and generally goes to customers’ homes, workplaces or schools, repeatedly did work in urban areas but billed insurers as if the work had been done from the rural Port Townsend area. The company’s Port Townsend location consists of a storage unit. The company does not use that location to conduct their business, according to the insurance commissioner’s office.