In July, the CFPB and 11 states filed an adversary complaint in bankruptcy court against Prehired — a company that operated a private, for-profit vocational training program for software sales representatives. Promising entry-level wages of over $100,000, Prehired charged $30,000 for its program and encouraged students to enter into income share loans. The CFPB alleged […]
The Washington Post reports: “From airlines to ticket sellers, companies fight U.S. to keep junk fees. An array of powerful moneyed lobbyists have warred with the Biden administration over its new regulatory crackdown as they scramble to protect their profits.” The full article is here.
The Federal Communications Commission and the Federal Trade Commission recently released notices to gather information on the use of advanced technologies in consumer sectors that the regulators oversee. The FCC announced that it is exploring emerging AI technologies and their connection to its work to protect consumers from unwanted and illegal calls and text messages […]
Reuters’s Allson Frankel has the story here, and also reports on industry opposition. The original petition, as well as the comments, can be read here. Here’s an excerpt from the law professor comment (disclosure: I served on the drafting committee): Multiple studies have demonstrated that consumers do not understand arbitration clauses. In contrast, no study […]
If items are always on sale, are they really on sale at all? This is the question underlying the plaintiff’s claim in Hennessey v. The Gap, a case in which an Eighth Circuit decision issued yesterday, affirming the dismissal of a consumer class action. The named plaintiff sued the Gap and Old Navy, alleging that sale […]
Mark Edwin Burge of Texas A&M has written After FTX: Can the Original Bitcoin Use Case Be Saved?, 72 Kansas Law Review, (2023). Here is the abstract: Bitcoin and the other cryptocurrencies spawned by the innovation of blockchain programming have exploded in prominence, both in gains of massive market value and in dramatic market losses, […]
Corporate defendants have long pretended that their interests in mandatory, individual arbitration clauses are directed at the fact that arbitration provides an efficient, adequate forum for consumers to vindicate their claims for relief– not in effectively blocking consumers from obtaining any meaningful relief. As more and more plaintiffs have been taking such defendants at their […]
The Fair Credit Reporting Act provides that consumers that establish a consumer reporting agency has willfully failed to comply with the statute’s requirement may recover either (1) their actual damages, or (2) “damages of not less than $100 and not more than $1,000.” In Santos v. Healthcare Revenue Recovery Group, LLC, Experian argued that, in order […]
The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau announced today that it has ordered Citi to pay $25.9 million in fines and consumer redress for intentionally and illegally discriminating against credit card applicants the bank identified as Armenian American. The CFPB explains: “From 2015 through 2021, Citi singled out for discrimination applicants for certain credit card products, based […]
The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau is proposing to supervise larger nonbank companies that offer services like digital wallets and payment apps. The CFPB explains: “Driven largely by Big Tech and other large technology firms, digital payment apps and wallets continue to grow in popularity, but many of the companies are not subject to CFPB supervisory […]