by Jeff Sovern Another self-serving post: West has just published the 2013 edition of Selected Consumer Statutes, which I edited along with John A. Spanogle, Ralph J. Rohner, Dee Pridgen, and Christopher L. Peterson. The book should be useful not just for consumer law courses, but also for consumer law practitioners who want a portable […]
Author Archives: Jeff Sovern
Though the confirmation of CFPB Director Cordray mutes the issue of CFPB accountabilty, it does not moot it. Those who remain interested in the issue may wish to consult Susan Block-Lieb of Fordham's paper, Accountability and the Bureau of Consumer Financial Protection, 7 Brooklyn Journal of Corporate, Financial & Commercial Law (2013). Here's the abstract: […]
by Jeff Sovern Here. According to the story, Republicans agreed to vote for Cordray because he promised to testify before (Portman's phrasing) brief (according to the CFPB spokesperson) the Appropriations Committee on the CFPB budget. Another piece of the agreement, according to Portman, is that the Bureau will implement cost-benefit analysis of CFPB regulations, though […]
by Jeff Sovern The federal Magnuson-Moss Warranty Act obliges sellers of most warranted consumer products to label the warranty either "full" or "limited." 15 U.S.C. § 2303(a). But that distinction serves little purpose if manufacturers never provide full warranties. I wondered how common full warranties are, and so I asked a research assistant, Eric Levine, […]
by Jeff Sovern Last week, we linked to Ed Mierzwinski's post about complaints about CFPB information-gathering processes. There's more. Over at the Taking Charge blog, Fred Williams has a post on the CFPB data collection, Privacy Agencies Say Don't Worry: Consumer Bureau is No Spy. Here's an excerpt: "I am not aware of any privacy […]
by Jeff Sovern As Deepak pointed out last week, a lot has been going on in debt collection, and one item is that the CFPB has issued a bulletin stating that people subject to its jurisdiction may not commit unfair, deceptive, or abusive practices in collecting debts. The Fair Debt Collection Practices Act generally does […]
Ed's excellent post is here. Those who purport to be so concerned about the privacy of bank customers should seek to amend the Gramm-Leach-Bliley privacy provisions to bar banks from selling consumer information unless their customers affirmatively opt-in to the sale of that information. But that would mean supporting consumer protection, precisely what the CFPB […]
Here. The article is about the problem of boilerplate more generally than the headline suggests and is definitely worth a read. Here's my favorite quote: “I’m not someone who wags his finger and says you should read [online contracts],” said Douglas G. Baird, a professor of law at the University of Chicago. “If you read […]
Amy Schmitz of Colorado has written Ensuring Remedies to Cure Cramming, 14 Cardozo J. of Conflict Resolution 877 (2013). Here's the abstract: The unauthorized addition of third party charges to telecommunications bills ("cramming") is a growing problem that has caught the attention of federal regulators and state attorney generals. This Article therefore discusses the problems […]
by Jeff Sovern This is completely self-serving, but law professor readers of this blog may be interested to learn that the fourth edition of our casebook, Consumer Law, Cases and Materials, Fourth Edition is now available. As I said in April, our goal was to continue comprehensive coverage of core consumer law subjects (like deceptive advertising, Truth in Lending, […]