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On September 9, 2014, then-Governor Jerry Brown of California signed into law Assembly Bill No. 2365. The law, which went into effect in January of 2015, prohibits contracts for the sale or lease of consumer goods from including a provision waiving the consumer’s right “to make any statement regarding the seller or lessor or its employees or agents, or concerning the goods or services.”… Continue Reading

After nearly a decade of litigation, Judge Beryl A. Howell of the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia has approved the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau’s $6.0 million settlement of class claims of alleged discrimination by the CFPB against 85 Black and Hispanic employees. The class consists of all “minority employees and women who work or worked as Consumer Response Specialists and have been subjected to and harmed by the Bureau’s agency-wide pattern or practice of discrimination and retaliation and discriminatory policies and practices,” according to the complaint.… Continue Reading

A Rhode Island federal district court recently refused to enforce a stand-alone class action waiver in the consumer plaintiff’s automobile lease agreement on the ground that it violates state public policy.  The court in Metcalfe v. Grieco Hyundai LLC held that the class action waiver contravened Section 6-13.1-5.2 of Rhode Island’s Deceptive Trade Practices Act (DTPA), which provides that consumers “may … bring an action on behalf of themselves and other similarly injured and situated persons to recover damages.” … Continue Reading

The Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals in Henderson v. Source For Pub. Data, L.P., No. 21-1678, 2022 U.S. App. LEXIS 30534 (4th Cir. Nov. 3, 2022) found that the protections of Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act did not extend to a public data aggregation company.  The ruling reversed the district court’s order dismissing all claims in a putative class action alleging Fair Credit Reporting Act (“FCRA”) violations against the data aggregator, PublicData.com… Continue Reading

On October 25, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit affirmed a district court’s order dismissing a class action alleging that an Illinois internet-based credit union breached its account agreement when it charged non-sufficient funds (NSF) fees to its customers. Plaintiff alleged the account agreement required the credit union to use the ledger-balance to assess NSF fees and only assess one NSF fee per transaction.… Continue Reading

Represented by a team of Ballard Spahr attorneys, a seller of consumer products recently defeated the plaintiffs’ motion to certify a class in their lawsuit filed in Utah federal district court alleging violations of the Telephone Consumer Protection Act (TCPA) by the seller and another defendant.  My fellow Ballard team members were Jenny Perkins, Will Reilly, and Ashley Waddoups.… Continue Reading

The Eighth Circuit reiterated in a decision last month that trial courts must distinguish between FCRA plaintiffs who have suffered concrete harm and plaintiffs who merely seek to collect statutorily allowed damages as a way to ensure compliance with the law.  Under the Supreme Court’s decision in Spokeo, the former have Article III standing to assert FCRA claims but the latter do not.… Continue Reading

After discussing the pandemic’s impact on 2020 litigation, we share our expectations for 2021, including pandemic-related and other types of claims most likely to be alleged in private litigation and enforcement actions, how litigation could be impacted by possible legislative changes, and the potential implications of a more aggressive CFPB for case resolution. … Continue Reading

The Supreme Court has granted certiorari to review a $40 million class action trial judgment for statutory and punitive damages under the Fair Credit Reporting Act, and its forthcoming decision later this Term will likely be the Supreme Court’s most important ruling in the consumer financial services space since its 2016 ruling in Spokeo, Inc.… Continue Reading