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Courts Reject Tech Corporation Bans on Class Action Suits
Frosty Piss writes "Class action waivers included in cell phone companies' contracts with customers are invalid in Washington State because they violate the state's Consumer Protection Act, the state Supreme Court ruled Thursday. Five plaintiffs accused Cingular of overcharging customers between $1 and $40 per month in roaming and hidden charges. Cingular had an arbitration clause that required individual arbitration and prohibited class action litigation or class action arbitration. From the article: 'In another class action-related ruling issued Thursday, the high court unanimously ruled in favor of a couple that filed a class action suit against America Online, Inc., claiming the Internet provider created and charged them for secondary membership accounts that they didn't want.'"
Too many companies nowadays are taking advantage of the vast amount of population that pay money for a service that they don't completely understand. How many people actually know what all of those surcharges on their cellular/telephone/isp bills are for? I hope this ruling occurs eventually in New York as well.
Just a reminder, kids. Just because you put something in a "contract" doesn't make it legal or enforceable. No need to get your panties in a bunch over the fine print in cell phone contracts, EULA's, etc.
I don't respond to AC's.
This is not to mention the bad publicity that comes from losing a major class action suit. That's probably where the most harm comes to a company in the long run. In this case the adage that "Any publicity is good publicity" is probably wrong as these are already well known entities. Of course the only "public" that hears about this may only be slashdot, which has the numbers to take down a server, but probably not a Fortune 500.
When the class gets paid in vouchers, the lawyers should be paid in vouchers.
Many contracts limit your ability to sue in a real court. They exist in everything from vehicle purchase contracts to fitness club contracts. The best thing consumers can do is to read the contracts, know their rights, reject contracts where such provisions can't be removed and tell the salespeople why this isn't acceptable.
Any business that forces a customer into binding arbitration in a contract can't be trusted.
So, if you sign a cell phone contract, with a 14 day return policy, and on day 20 you get your bill and discover that they've overcharged you, you are a coward? Your options are basically:
The game is tilted against the consumer in these scenarios. And I'm glad this ruling came down the way it did. It's not right that a contract can force you to give up your legal right to seek relief in court. And before any wise-ass comes back with "then don't sign it", try living with a cell phone, credit card, phone service, bank account, etc, etc, etc. They are all doing it!
I want peace on earth and goodwill toward man.
We are the United States Government! We don't do that sort of thing.
Class action lawsuits is one way to level the playing field and make companies care about their consumers by going after the only thing they understand: their bottom lines.
After all, the companies have massive legal departments, paid 24/7 access to the Congress with the ability to (re)write the laws, they can drag out even the most solidly grounded lawsuits forever through the appeals process and wait for the victim to go bankrupt with all those legal and court fees. Any individual claims that do get through all the way are likely to be small, and will not impact the profit margins at all.
Consequently, limiting class-action suits, along with court-awarded damages and restitution is a horrible idea; corporations would be able to literally kill thousands and still turn a profit!
Obama likes poor people so much, he wants to make more of them.
If I'm screwed out of a lot of money, I'd want compensation, but if I only have a small loss, I'm mostly interested in the company not benefitting from screwing me over. Having them stop is more important to me for those situations. But the time and cost to myself is too high for an individual.
If the lawyer can shoulder the time and cost, I don't mind them getting a big payout, I wouldn't hope to get much back if I only lost like 50 bucks to the corporation. Hopefully they'll change their policy and that would still help me at least.
Cool, I want to be cell-phone only so I don't have to deal with two numbers. Since it's my primary line, find me a pre-paid plan that's competitive. Counting nights and weekends I use about 2,500 - 3,000 minutes a month. On a post-paid plan of $39.99 (1k peak minutes/unlim n&w on T-Mobile) that's $0.013 a min for 3,000 minutes. Find me a pre-paid plan that's competitive with that.
Oh, that's right, you can't, because the pre-paid offerings are purposefully crippled to make them useless for anything but light use.
I want peace on earth and goodwill toward man.
We are the United States Government! We don't do that sort of thing.