BUSINESS NOTES.

CUSTOMERS SUING BANKAMERICA, GREAT WESTERN: Customers of BankAmerica Corp. and Great Western Financial are suing the banks for delays in returning property titles once they repaid their mortgages.

California Superior Court Judge Bruce Mitchell last week upheld an order to certify Coldiron vs. Bank of America as a class action. As many as 575,000 customers who paid the title conveyance fee from April 1993 to the present are eligible.

The Coldiron suit, filed in Los Angeles Superior Court in June 1994, said BankAmerica and Great Western charged as much as $65 in fees for reconveying titles to borrowers but failed to perform this service in the time mandated by state laws, the suit said.

?13- Bloomberg News

LEVITZ TO PAY $10 MILLION: Levitz Furniture Corp., a nationwide retailer with numerous Southland stores, agreed Tuesday to pay $10 million in restitution and fines for duping customers into buying credit insurance.

Some 300,000 customers who opened revolving credit accounts at Levitz's 35 California stores may be entitled to restitution, according to the company's settlement of a lawsuit filed by the state insurance commissioner and several district attorneys.

Levitz and co-defendants American Bankers Insurance Co. and General Electric Capital Corp. did not admit wrongdoing in the Alameda Superior Court settlement, said Dana Spurrier, a spokeswoman for Insurance Commissioner Chuck Quackenbush.

She said that as a result of Levitz's action, many Levitz customers bought a package of optional credit insurance products, without knowing they had done so or believing that they were free, she said.

?13- Bloomberg News

JUSTICE DEPARTMENT LOOKS INTO MICROSOFT: Broadening its scrutiny of Microsoft Corp., the Justice Department is reviewing the software giant's proposed $150 million investment in Apple Computer Inc. and its stake in three smaller companies.

The government wants to find out if some of Microsoft's latest deals may be stifling competition in the high-tech business, violating an earlier agreement.

Separate from Apple, federal antitrust investigators said Tuesday they are looking into Microsoft's purchase of stakes in three companies that make video technology that works across the World Wide Web.

?13- Associated Press

BAUSCH & LOMB AGREES TO PAY $1.7 MILLION SETTLEMENT: Bausch & Lomb Inc. said it will pay $1.7 million to end an investigation by 17 states into claims it sold identical contact lenses under three brand names for widely varying prices.

The eye wear and health care products company did not admit any wrongdoing in agreeing to the settlement Tuesday, which essentially avoids a lawsuit by the states. Bausch & Lomb discontinued the practice in 1995.

The company set aside $68 million in August 1996 to settle a class-action lawsuit claiming customers were defrauded because they paid more in the belief they were getting different lenses.

?13- Associated Press