Stephen B. Burbank of Pennsylvania, Sean Farhang of Berkeley' s Goldman School of Public Policy, and Herbert M. Kritzer of Minnesota have written Private Enforcement, 17 Lewis & Clark Law Review 637 (2013). Here's the abstract: Our aim in this Article is to advance understanding of private enforcement of statutory and administrative law in the […]
Category Archives: Unfair & Deceptive Acts & Practices (UDAP), including Discrimination
From time to time, news media run a story on car repair outfits that cheat consumers. Unfortunately, there seems to be an inexhaustible supply of such businesses, perhaps because most consumers lack the ability to determine if they are being ripped off by their mechanics. You can find another such story here.
Suddenly, there's a lot going on the in the world of debt collection regulation. On the heels of yesterday's announcement by the FTC of a huge debt-collection settlement (discussed in the post below), the CFPB is announcing today that it will use its UDAAP authority to regulate the collection practices of banks. “It doesn’t matter […]
From Dee Pridgen: The Wyoming State Attorney General’s office recently completed its first major in-state enforcement action in recent history against the Sharps Rifle Company. The company was manufacturing a collector's item replica pistol. Sharps took deposits and payments from customers for the pistols, but never delivered the product due to technical difficulties in the […]
Here. When consumers see celibrities endorse products on TV, they are likely to believe that the celebrities are being paid. Do consumers have the same reaction to tweets endorsing things? Should celebrities disclose that when they are paid for tweets?
Big news: The CFPB today filed the first lawsuit that invokes the agency's authority under the Dodd-Frank Act to police practices that are not just unfair or deceptive, but "abusive." Observers of the agency have been eagerly anticipating the first use of that authority, which is new to the world of consumer law. The Bureau's Action […]
by Jeff Sovern Here (behind a paywall, unfortunately). But here's the part that's not behind the paywall: To avoid unwanted scrutiny from the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau and other regulators, banks need to start thinking about "what is fair, not just what is legal," banking attorneys say. And isn't that one of the reasons we […]
by Jeff Sovern Here. An excerpt: As with the mortgage cases, the investigation focuses on the banks' poor paperwork and their weak tracking of the debts. When they sold delinquent credit card debt to the buyers, often at only a few cents on the dollar, they allegedly failed to provide them with the evidence that […]
On Wednesday the Ninth Circuit gave Wells Fargo a belated Christmas present in Gutierrez v. Wells Fargo Bank, — F.3d —-, 2012 WL 6684748 (9th Cir. 2012), vacating the injunctive and restitution relief ordered by the lower court. The district court decision had held Wells Fargo's procedures for ordering debit card withdrawals unfair and fraudulent […]