Public Citizen and 25 other U.S. and international groups concerned with consumer rights and electronic privacy have sent a letter to Facebook asking it to release documents about whether it has collected and analyzed psychological information about its youthful users for marketing purposes. The claim that Facebook had engaged in such analysis and hyped it to […]
Author Archives: Scott Nelson
Opponents of payday loan reform argue that the payday loan industry benefits its customers by providing access to credit for customers who could not otherwise obtain it, and that it is paternalistic to deny consumers the opportunity to afford themselves of these benefits. Payday loan customers, however, have a different view: Bring on the “paternalism.” […]
In its decision issued today in McGill v. Citibank, the California Supreme Court has unanimously held that arbitration agreements can't block consumers from seeking injunctive relief that benefits the general public under California's Consumers Legal Remedies Act (CLRA) and Unfair Competition Law (UCL). The decision strikes a blow against corporate efforts to use arbitration not just to […]
The Trump transition team has indicated that the new administration's strategy for Dodd-Frank is likely to be piecemeal dismantling rather than wholesale repeal, according to multiple reports, including this one by NPR. Meanwhile, the auto industry hopes the new administration will roll back targets for fuel efficiency, according to the Hill, while the Credit Union […]
In an opinion and order issued today, U.S. District Judge Michael Mills of the Northern District of Mississippi issued a preliminary injunction blocking enforcement of the CMS rule barring the use of predispute arbitration agreements by nursing homes that participate in the Medicare and Medicaid programs. The court did not definitively hold the rule unlawful, but found it […]
I've written a short opinion piece for The Hill called "The D.C. Circuit demotes Richard Cordray." It's available here.
The case the Supreme Court agreed to hear today, Midland Funding v. Johnson, involves both whether filing a proof of claim for a time-barred debt in a bankruptcy proceeding is debt collection activity that violates the Fair Debt Collection Practices Act and whether, if so, the Bankruptcy Code effectively preempts the FDCPA's application to bankruptcy […]
In a regulation issued today, for publication early next week in the Federal Register, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services of the Department of Health and Human Services have banned nursing homes that participate in the Medicare and Medicaid programs from entering into predispute arbitration agreements with patients. The Centers had proposed only to […]
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit ruled yesterday that drivers for the alt-cab company Uber have to arbitrate claims against the company. The decision means that those drivers are out of court on most of their claims, but also that they cannot proceed on a classwide basis. The case is Mohamed v. Uber […]
On Wednesday of this week, a federal district court in California handed the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau a victory in its lawsuit against consumer lender CashCall. The court's ruling grants the CFPB partial summary judgment on its claim that CashCall committed deceptive acts in violation of the Consumer Financial Protection Act by collecting illegal interest […]