Generally, when you read an opinion holding that there was insufficient evidence of an arbitration agreement between a consumer and a corporation, it’s a win for the plaintiff. But in Wallrich v. Samsung Electronics America, decided by the Seventh Circuit yesterday, the opposite was true. Paula Wallrich and several thousand other consumers had filed arbitration […]
Category Archives: Arbitration
Will consumer protection come up during the debate? My guess is not. It seems unlikely that a moderator or President Trump would raise it. I could see President Biden bringing up junk fees, as he has called for their regulation, in response to a question, though I am not expecting it. The headline issues have […]
From today’s decision in Coinbase, Inc. v. Suski. Longtime readers will recall the empirical evidence that consumers do not understand arbitration clauses and so, in my view, they have not “actually agreed” to arbitration clauses.
Tamar Meshel and Moin A. Yahya both of the University of Alberta – Faculty of Law, have written The Gatekeepers of the Federal Arbitration Act: An Empirical Analysis of the FAA in the Lower Courts, forthcoming in the Mississippi Law Journal. Here’s the abstract: This article presents the results of the first comprehensive empirical study of motions […]
Benjamin C. Zipursky of Fordham and Zahra Takhshid of Denver and Harvard’s Berkman Klein Center have written Consumer Protection and the Illusory Promise of the Unconscionability Defense, forthcoming in 103 Texas Law Review. Here’s the abstract: The United States Supreme Court’s notorious decision in AT&T Mobility LLC v. Concepcion seems to display impatience with the idea of […]
Samuel Becher of the Victoria University of Wellington and Tal Zarsky of the University of Haifa have written Big Mistake(s), forthcoming in the Florida Law Review. Here’s the abstract: The digital age has brought the imbalance of power between prominent firms and individual consumers to the forefront. Despite their proclamations of upholding democratic values and […]
Andrea J. Boyack of Missouri has written Abuse of Contract: Boilerplate Erasure of Consumer Counterparty Rights, Iowa Law Review, Forthcoming. Here’s the abstract: Contract law and the new Restatement of the Law of Consumer Contracts generally treats the entirety of the company’s boilerplate as presumptively binding. Entrusting the content of consumer contracts to companies creates a […]
Richard Frankel of Drexel has written Fighting Mass Arbitration: An Empirical Study of the Corporate Response to Mass Arbitration and Its Implications for the Federal Arbitration Act. Here’s the abstract: Over the last forty years, corporations have increasingly inserted mandatory arbitration provisions into their consumer and employment contracts. Most prominently, and with the Supreme Court’s blessing, […]
The industry often claims that arbitration is cheaper than litigation for consumers. Well, not so much any more–if that was ever true–after the AAA’s new mass arbitration rules that Adam Pulver reported about on January 29. Adam mentioned the $3,125 initiation fee. In addition, under the new rules, for cases that proceed beyond the initiation […]
E. Gary Spitko of Santa Clara has written Arbitration Secrecy, 108 Cornell Law Review 1729 (2023). Here’s the abstract: Parties to an arbitration contract may agree to a secrecy clause that will govern their arbitration process to protect the confidentiality of their proprietary or personal information. Of great concern, however, they also may use such an […]