In order to state a claim for deceptive practices, many state consumer protection laws require plaintiffs to prove that the challenged acts or practices are “likely to deceive reasonable consumers.” In an opinion issued today, the Seventh Circuit grappled with the question of what exactly that means. The opinion comes in a class action brought […]
Rebecca Crootof of Richmond Law and the Yale Information Society Project has written Remote Repossession, 73 DePaul Law Review, (forthcoming 2024). Here’s the abstract: Ford’s February 2023 patent application raises a new possibility: that after a default, an internet-connected vehicle might autonomously drive itself off of the owner’s premises—to a public space, to the repossession agency, […]
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 […]
Two new actions by the Federal Trade Commission today: FTC Takes Action Against Online Used Car Dealer Vroom for Deceiving Customers, Failing to Deliver on Time and Provide Required Disclosures FTC Takes Action Against Gig Work Company Arise Virtual Solutions for Deceiving Consumers About Pay in Marketing Its Business Opportunity
As I noted in yesterday’s post, Loper Bright preserves agency authority when Congress authorized the agency to exercise discretion. Loper Bright cited as an example of such a case Michigan v. EPA, in which, Loper Bright noted, Congress used a term or phrase that gives agencies flexibility, “such as ‘appropriate’ or ‘reasonable.” Now let’s look […]
Yesterday, the Supreme Court decided Loper Bright, in which it proclaimed that “Chevron is overruled.” But now we have to figure out what that means in particular contexts. One such context is federal consumer protection agency UDAAP statutes, like the FTC Act and Consumer Financial Protection Act. When those statutes give the agencies the power […]
We received the following Call for Abstracts for the Consumer Law Scholars Conference, always an important event for consumer law scholars: We are pleased to announce the seventh annual Consumer Law Scholars Conference (CLSC), which will be held Thursday and Friday, March 6-7, 2025 at Boston University. Save the date! The purpose of the CLSC is to support in-progress scholarship, foster […]
The National Consumer Law Center has released a student-loan toolkit. According to NCLC, it is “a free online resource to help borrowers navigate the student loan system and manage their debt. It’s also a resource for financial counselors, legal aid attorneys, and other advocates who advise borrowers on the options and strategies for their loan […]
The Federal Trade Commission annual Report on Refunds to Consumers tallies the total refunds to consumers in 2023 from FTC enforcement actions at more than $324 million. The report provides a breakdown of the total amount refunded by the FTC nationally, as well as the amount mailed to each state, and also includes a list […]
I’m not always consistent about whether I consider student loans part of consumer law. Government student loans are, as the name implies, a government program, rather than a consumer program. But sometimes I think of them as part of consumer law, perhaps because we also have private student loans or because the loans are used […]