Last month General Motors detailed its plan to compensate victims of crashes resulting from the long-ignored ignition defect, saying individual payouts could range anywhere from around $20,000 to the double-digit millions. Today, the car maker revealed how much it expects to pay in total when all this compensating is done.

In its quarterly financials [PDF], GM reported that it’s estimating that all payouts will add up to around $400 million, but concedes that it could go as high as $600 million.

The car company notes that these are just estimates and that there is no actual upper limit set for compensation payouts. That’s good to know, as there is still a lot of investigating to do before the full number of ignition-related incidents is tallied.

Additionally, the total amount will be affected by the number of potential claimants who choose to pursue legal action against GM instead of accepting a payout.

GM explained in June that potential claimants can file a claim with the company to preview their eligibility and payment, but their legal rights are not waived until they actually accept the compensation.

One other thing that may reduce the compensation amount for GM is the limited window of time to file claims. As of now, it will only be processing claims between August 1 and December 31. While that does give people five months to file, there is always the possibility that some eligible claimants will miss the deadline.

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