Kia Franklin

Seattle class action case

This Seattle Post-Intelligencer article and this blog cover a recent Washington State supreme court case, decided on Thursday, which held that Cingular can’t take away consumers’ right to file a class action lawsuit. The judge found that “the class-action waiver is unconscionable because it effectively denies large numbers of consumers the protection of Washington’s Consumer Protection Act.”

From the P-I:

“It’s a great victory for consumers,” said Paul Bland, a staff attorney with the non-profit Public Justice in D.C., who appealed the case on behalf of Cingular customers. “It’s going to be very important to other cases around the country. … This case is going to have a lot of legs.”

Businesses routinely include in their contracts provisions for mandatory arbitration and clauses that waive class action, he said. The 10 biggest credit card companies and nearly every cell phone company have such waivers, Bland said. Likewise, he said 90 percent of new cars sold in the U.S. come with these contracts.

Washington State Supreme Court: good call!

Posted at 2:12 PM, Jul 16, 2007 in Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0)