Supreme Court Scrutinizing Class Action Settlements That Leave Consumers Empty-Handed (marketwatch.com) 133
If a multimillion dollar class-action settlement basically doesn't pay a single consumer, is it fair? That's not the start of a lawyer joke; it's the crux of a case being argued Wednesday in the U.S. Supreme Court that, advocates say, has serious implications for the ways consumers benefit from duels with businesses in large-scale litigation. From a report (paywalled): "This is potentially billions of dollars going from everyday consumers to lawyers' slush funds," said Ted Frank, the litigation director at the Competitive Enterprise Institute, who's disputing the $8.5 million settlement between Google and 129 million class members before the Supreme Court. The case, Frank v. Gaos, focuses on the question of whether it's fair and reasonable to ever have class action settlements that give money to outside groups instead of the class members themselves. A decision for Frank -- who also happens to be a class member in the Google case and is a longtime gadfly questioning class action settlements -- could require the money go directly to consumers and upend a class action pay out method that's been around for decades.
The underlying case has to do with Google's 2013 agreement to pay $8.5 million to settle a case claiming widespread privacy rights violations. When any web surfer looked up topics on Google, the search engine beamed the search terms -- like "depression" and "medical leave" -- in the URL string to the third-party websites. The search term revelations broke various state and federal laws, plaintiffs said. After about three years of litigation, the parties settled. Google added more online disclosures and opened its wallet without admitting liability. The settlement's payouts included a $5,000 award for each of the three named plaintiffs and $2.12 million for the legal fees of the plaintiffs' lawyers. The remaining $5.3 million was divvied up among six universities and organizations pledging to put the money towards improving internet privacy. Lawyers for both Google and the class members say Frank's objections to the settlement are unfounded.
The underlying case has to do with Google's 2013 agreement to pay $8.5 million to settle a case claiming widespread privacy rights violations. When any web surfer looked up topics on Google, the search engine beamed the search terms -- like "depression" and "medical leave" -- in the URL string to the third-party websites. The search term revelations broke various state and federal laws, plaintiffs said. After about three years of litigation, the parties settled. Google added more online disclosures and opened its wallet without admitting liability. The settlement's payouts included a $5,000 award for each of the three named plaintiffs and $2.12 million for the legal fees of the plaintiffs' lawyers. The remaining $5.3 million was divvied up among six universities and organizations pledging to put the money towards improving internet privacy. Lawyers for both Google and the class members say Frank's objections to the settlement are unfounded.
Not just money (Score:5, Insightful)
Lots of lawsuits are about "stop doing that", not about "pay me money".
If a lawsuit makes a company stop doing something bad to millions of people, isn't that a good thing?
Now, if you want to talk about what's fair & reasonable in lawyer fees, that's another conversation...
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You wouldn't happen to be a lawyer that specializes in class action lawsuits, would you?
Just curious...
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Just stopping a company from doing it AGAIN doesn't mean you get compensation for when it was done to YOU, which is what a class-action lawsuit should usually be about.
Re:Not just money (Score:5, Interesting)
Just stopping a company from doing it AGAIN doesn't mean you get compensation for when it was done to YOU, which is what a class-action lawsuit should usually be about.
If class-action lawsuits don't make money for the lawyers, then they won't happen at all.
You should think of class-actions as an outsourcing of regulation to the private sector. If the government won't regulate corporate behavior, then profit-seeking law firms will.
Ask yourself this: Should we have more class actions, or fewer? Answer: I dunno.
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On the other hand the lawyers can't bring the cases all on their own without an injured party, so if the civilians don't see any benefit to going through the hassle of a trial (because let's face it, most of us don't have the time or resources for that just to make sure bad things don't happen to OTHER people) then we'll lose that avenue of regulation anyway.
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On the other hand the lawyers can't bring the cases all on their own without an injured party
They just need one lead client to represent the class. In this case the three lead clients received $5000 each for doing basically nothing. The lawyers will not have any problem recruiting lead clients.
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On the other hand the lawyers can't bring the cases all on their own without an injured party
They just need one lead client to represent the class. In this case the three lead clients received $5000 each for doing basically nothing. The lawyers will not have any problem recruiting lead clients.
True. But if a significant number of those in the class opt out then the settlement falls apart. Opting out should be as easy as clicking on a web form instead of having to send back a signed document.
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It really riles me that a case can be brought forward with me opted in by default. I think the solution is to simply invert that to opt out by default. You need me as a class member? Pitch your case to me and let me opt in.... you know how you would get me to opt in? Offer me some money....
The fact that my name can be used in order to line someone else's pockets doesn't sit well with me at all...
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I think the solution is to simply invert that to opt out by default.
If this was the case, the lawsuit in TFA against Google would have never happened. Corporations would be free to act with impunity as long as their misbehavior was widely distributed.
There is absolutely no way that it is cost effective to get 100 million people to "opt-in" when the damages are a few cents each.
Re: Not just money (Score:3)
They are already free to act with impugnity. The Supreme Court ruled that companies can write themselves out of accountability, and even the law, with arbitration agreements, and these agreements
Re: Not just money (Score:2)
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Thats the probelm - the people who were injured get pennies or nothing and lose the right to sue, while a handful of lawyers get... $2.12 million??
That is not justice.
Then what do you suggest instead?
1. No lawsuit at all? (the GPP's solution)
2. A 6 cent check to anyone willing to pay the printing and postage fee?
3. Use Google Search free for a year?
4. ???
Disclaimer: I use Google Search, so 6 cents of that money is MINE, and I am happy to see it go to a university. I plan to deduct it as a donation on my taxes.
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It should not sit well with you. This system of class action suits is a very imperfect bandaid, yet still better than open bleeding wounds, at least it seems so to me.
The overall cheaper answer might be to have a regulator who can levy fines based on reasonable legislative guidance -- you do not need millions of dollars in lawyers fees to accomplish that, assuming you trust regulators to not be "overzealous". Of course, class action law specialists might be overzealous, too, but that is apparently more ac
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The $5000 for each of the 3 named plaintiffs is what sounded egregious to me. For compensatory damages it may be ok, but any punitive damage should have had a big chunk going to back to those three at the very least.
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That's true. The biggest problem is that the class members can't afford to fight these giant corporations on their own dime.
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Ask yourself this: Should we have more class actions, or fewer? Answer: I dunno.
I do, it's quite clear the class-action ecosystem of America has done (to excuse my french) fuck all for consumers. There have been far greater effects of actual laws that regulate behaviour, to say nothing of countries which actually have consumer advocacy departments that enforce those regulations with actual punishment.
If this is nothing more than "outsourcing" to the private sector then it appears to be working as well as any other outsourcing claim does. Just look at the Xbox360 red ring issue:
Australi
Re:Not just money (Score:5, Interesting)
If a lawsuit makes a company stop doing something bad to millions of people, isn't that a good thing?
Getting someone to stop engaging in illegal behavior is step one of setting things right. But there's also a step two: making reparations for harm done. That didn't happen here. Instead, the plaintiff's lawyers arranged for the settlement money to be funneled into groups to which they or their friends belong. Despite millions of people being harmed by Google's behavior, only the three named plaintiffs received even a cent.
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Getting someone to stop engaging in illegal behavior is step one of setting things right
The reason there is a lawsuit to begin with is there is a dispute over whether or not the behavior is bad and/or illegal.
So yes, getting a particular behavior declared "bad" is a win.
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So yes, getting a particular behavior declared "bad" is a win.
I wouldn't call it a "win". I'd call it "necessary but not sufficient". As I said, it's a first step, but there's more that needs to be done to right the wrong that was done.
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Instead, the plaintiff's lawyers arranged for the settlement money to be funneled into groups to which they or their friends belong.
How do you divide 5 million dollars between 129 million people? The postage alone eats the money in full. If you want to argue that the settlement amount was too small, I won't argue with that. But if you want to argue that a bunch of empty envelopes should have been mailed to half the settlement class before the money ran out, I don't see how we're in a better place than we're starting.
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How do you divide 5 million dollars between 129 million people?
You don't. The 129 million people do it themselves.
At least with the handful of class action settlements I've been a party to, they send out notifications to the people in the class (via e-mail, mail, whatever) indicating that a settlement has been made, that the person may be entitled to a portion of the settlement, and that if the person wants to exclude themselves from the class so as to retain the right to pursue their own suit against the company later, they'll need to say so. Towards that end, there's
Huh? You seem to understand, but wtf ? (Score:2)
I'm confused about what you're saying.
All along you seem to understand things, then in the last sentence you make a conclusion that doesn't follow from your (correct) statements.
You start with the class, people who have used Google search. That's maybe a hundred million people.
Subtract the people who don't want to be considered part of the class, so that they could theoretically sue individually. That's a few thousand people, maybe.
After subtracting the ~ zeroish people who want to sue individually, you're
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The jump from a hundred million to a few thousand was in this line:
Towards that end, there's generally a web form where claimants can go to either exclude themselves from the settlement or submit the necessary information to make their claim.
Most people don't bother with the paperwork, so they don't get a portion of the payout.
Makes sense. Different from my experience (Score:2)
Okay, your post and reasoning makes sense to me now. Thanks.
My experience regarding the facts has been different from yours. As you said:
> At least with the handful of class action settlements I've been a party to, they send out notifications to the people in the class
At this point they already have my name and address and know I'm a class member, so they have all the information they need to send a check. I can opt OUT at that point. The lawyer would prefer I didn't, because they want to represent a la
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Actually, your experience matches well with most of mine as well.
Take the Playstation Network breach from a few years back, for instance. I was a party to it since I had an account with them at the time that it happened, but my credit card showed no signs of illicit activity after the hack, so I suffered no demonstrable harm. As such, I wasn't entitled to a monetary settlement, but I was entitled to a free game from a list of available options. When the time to finalize things finally arrived, I had to fill
Monetary vs non-monetary probably the difference (Score:2)
I think you're considering two steps where you can respond.
1. Exclude yourself from the suit (or not).
2. Claim non-monetary compensation such as a free game.
Step 1 goes directly to the question of how many plaintiffs are representes in the suit. If the lawyer is suing on behalf of five people, the settlement or judgement will be a lot smaller than if they are suing on behalf of 50,000 people. Therefore that step needs to be completed before the settlement or judgement.
Step 2 would be after the judgement or
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Good point about it being two steps. I can't say with certainty whether those steps were distinct or done at the same time in the settlements I was party to. In my recollection they were done at once, but if I'm being honest I must admit that it's entirely possible I'm mistaken and that they were actually distinct steps. I can't say with certainty.
And I'll readily agree that there are cases where there is no good outcome. Going back to my initial comment near the top of the thread, I threw those ideas out t
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there is always a well-known solution to every human problem â" neat, plausible, and wrong. :)
- HL Mencken
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You've got those numbers reversed. It's 3.8 cents per each of 129 million victims.
Re:Not just money (Score:4, Informative)
However, the class action settlement in TFA was simply a cash payout to pretty much everyone but the class with not even a promise to consider changing any behavior.
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Then there are the bull shit ones. Ambulance chasing Lawyers. Not a thing
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There is nothing mutually exclusive about "stop doing that" and "you need to pay for the real harm you did to me".
Re:Not just money (Score:4, Interesting)
The suit is on behalf of class members. If there's a settlement; 99% of the proceeds ought to go to benefit the class members whose right to sue is being exhausted by the settlement. The lawyers can keep up to 1% for their expenses.
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The lawyers can keep up to 1% for their expenses.
This is effectively an abolition of class action lawsuits.
Law firms are businesses, not charities.
Lawyers will get nothing. Harmed consumers will get nothing. Corporations will have impunity.
I've got an even scarier thought for you (Score:1)
Nope, they're gonna sue you and me (since we can't afford to buy off a Senator or House rep to defend us). As the Chinese say, Interesting Times.
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Nobody is saying lawyers should do this for free. The objection is to the
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$250k-$400k is just so little money lawyers aren't going to bother?
Correct. They wouldn't bother. It takes a team of lawyers, and they have to pay their staff, rent, taxes, etc. And there is a VERY good chance that the case will fall apart, class action status will be denied, or they will lose in court. Then they get $0, but still have to pay their staff, and the rent, etc. They might even get counter-sued.
These suits are like lotteries for lawyers
That is exactly what they are. So how may lottery tickets could you sell for $1 if you have a one-in-a-million chance to win, and the payoff is $5? The payoff has
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If the case took a couple of years, say, then the expense to the law firm will be very high. That's two years of expensive lawyer salary (ignoring the obvious jacking up of hourly rates). That could add up to two million dollars easily.
When there's a settlement involved, generally they're going to ask for legal fees as a part of the negotiation. If it goes to court and they win, then the judge adds in legal fees. That is, the amount that goes to the lawyers is not carved out of the damages after the cas
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If it goes to court and they win, then the judge adds in legal fees.
More often than not this does NOT happen. Both sides pay their own legal fees.
The rare exceptions are usually when the judge thinks the case is frivolous (plaintiff pays defendants fees) or slam-dunk (defendant pays plaintiff fees).
Does the losing side have to pay? [nolo.com]
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Subtract legal fees first. Sure, it's not as much as what the lawyers want but it will compensate them for the time and effort put into the case. However the "fees" should be checked over first to make sure they're not padded. One advantage is that it may let lawyers put in enough time to do the suit but not enough that they're going to drag it out for years.
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Parity in amount: The class receives as much money as the attorneys. Distribution costs are split evenly between the attorneys and the class.
Parity in time: The attorneys aren't paid until the class is paid. If the settlement for the class is in the form of a trust that pays out over time (say for medical expenses as they are incurred), the attorneys are paid proportionately over time as well. Yes, attorneys would prefer to be paid immediately in a lump sum: a
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Why? You'd kill class action suits as a way of suing large companies so I'm sure they'd be all in favour of this change. Personally I think 1,000% of the benefits ought to go to the class members, because if we're going to be ridiculous then why not go balls deep.
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Why? You'd kill class action suits as a way of suing large companies so I'm sure they'd be all in favour of this change.
No.... You'd kill "bullshit" class action suits that are being pursued to line some lawyer or sponsor's pocketbooks while the public doesn't get much benefit.
If the class action is for say 100 Million $$, then the lawyers still get $1 Million.
I'm also in favor of calculating a percentage of the amount in dispute for normal cases that aren't class actions -- civil trials in
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I suspect this is very effective corporate propaganda happening right now.
It's being clothed as consumer protection, but really this is about making class actions harder to settle and harder to enforce in the long run.
Imagine 2 scenarios:
In the first, the company gives 15 million to watchdogs that help keep an eye on things
in the second, the company gives each of 1.5 million people $10, but to get that $10 each person has to put out half an hour of effort.
Which one is going to more properly act as a private
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Lots of lawsuits are about "stop doing that", not about "pay me money".
If a lawsuit makes a company stop doing something bad to millions of people, isn't that a good thing?
If the settlement costs less than the profit made from doing something bad, how does the settlement stop them from doing something bad?
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If a lawsuit makes a company stop doing something bad to millions of people, isn't that a good thing?
If a company is doing bad things to millions of people they deserve to go bankrupt, not to get a slap on a wrist via class action settlements. Class action settlements are a lawyer taking the ability to sue away from millions of people who have to manually opt-out (without even knowing such a lawsuit has begun most of the time,) and then giving them little to nothing in return. If a company fucks over 100,000,000 people and has to pay out $100,000,000 but did several thousand in damage to each individual
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But if it's not enough to pay the operations of the law firm, then what? Yes, the senior partners are very well paid, but they also have a large team of juniors, associates, paralegals, and misc. staff. Those people need to be paid for the time they spent working. Then there's rent on their offices, travel expenses, court fees, etc. So either the amount of settlements has to go up to pay for it, or they firm won't bother taking the class action case. Don't even think about it going to court, that's too
Class Action is like Obamacare (Score:5, Insightful)
I worked for a company that made everyone come in 20 minutes early to set up their workstations and leave 10 minutes late, all unpaid. 30 minutes free labor a day times several thousand employees. It was millions. I didn't get much from the lawsuit but the company did have to start paying me for those 30 minutes.
My state doesn't have a labor board (there's one on paper but it's not funded). The threat of lawyers suing for a big payday is the only thing keeping most companies honest in my neck of the woods.
Like Arbitration this strikes me as the latest attack on that very minimal protection consumers have. Would I like to live in a world where I don't rely on skeezy lawyers getting big cash payouts for little to no work as the only protection I have from abuse by mega-corps? You bet. But I don't. I live in the real world, and I'm a realist. Until I can get folks to vote for genuine change [justicedemocrats.com] I'll take what I can get.
workers really need an union to stand up to bs (Score:2)
workers really need an union to stand up to bs like that!
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workers really need an union to stand up to bs like that!
The workers would have to pay union dues.
The corporation paid for the lawsuit.
So the lawyers gave the workers a better deal than they would have got from a union.
It was't Union dues that killed Unions (Score:1)
Come to think of it that's the other trouble Unions have: Employers learn
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Employees didn't learn a god damn thing.
They learned that the union shop is the first one to be automated, outsourced, or off-shored.
they go to their job that pays well and is safe because of a Union from 50 years ago who won those protections at the barrel of a gun.
Sure, but what have they done for us lately? Saying we should pay union dues today because unions made sense 50 years ago isn't a very compelling argument.
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The threat of lawyers suing for a big payday is the only thing keeping most companies honest in my neck of the woods.
You may have misread; this isn't about prohibiting the layers from getting a big payday. It's about the people supposedly being represented in the suit getting nothing at all.
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There's one pool of money at the end. If you require $$ to go to the people in the class, it's not available to go to the lawyers.
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There's one pool of money at the end. If you require $$ to go to the people in the class, it's not available to go to the lawyers.
Please read the summary; the case in question paid 3/8 of the money to the layers, not 8/8ths. The remaining 5/8 did not go to the people being represented but to "six universities and organizations". That is what the suit in the article is about. The layers can indeed be on the lookout for a payday (the concern of the person I responded to) AND the people being represented can get something instead of "six universities".
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The "harmed class" is everyone who ever used Google Search.
There isn't exactly a list of these people with names and addresses to send them each a check for 20 cents (sent postage due).
Giving some money to a few universities seems like a reasonable compromise. What else could they do?
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This This THIS! It's often impractical to break up a settlement among the members of the class and have the payment be anything but laughable. But if there's a nonprofit and not-evil competitor then sending the money (or a good part of it) to them is eminently better than sending it to a few pet universities where most of it will be consumed by administrative overhead.
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By limiting what can go to members of the class, you limit what money can go to anything else.
So if you require 7/8ths go to the harmed class, that leaves only 1/8th for the lawyers. Which means fewer lawsuits. Which is why they're pushing this change.
Impracticable payments? (Score:2)
Using the example from TFA/TFS: "$8.5 million settlement between Google and 129 million class members"
8.5/129 = $0.065 per person
How do the authors propose to distribute those six-and-a-half-cents? Via a postcard check, with $0.20 of postage?
Nuts, just the administration overhead to find & verify each class members would be more than six cents.
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How do the authors propose to distribute those six-and-a-half-cents? Via a postcard check, with $0.20 of postage?
The lowest class settlement postcard check I ever got was for $0.23.
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How do the authors propose to distribute those six-and-a-half-cents? Via a postcard check, with $0.20 of postage?
The lowest class settlement postcard check I ever got was for $0.23.
I actually got a useful class action settlement once. I played college football so I am now entitled to 2 free neurological screenings. I'm only 32, but I have actually noticed some mental decline in myself the past few years, mostly in short term memory. Well, at least I think I remember being able to remember things better.
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Have you considered the possibility that the mental decline preceded, and perhaps contributed to, your decision to bash your head into things?
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Have you considered the possibility that the mental decline preceded, and perhaps contributed to, your decision to bash your head into things?
Considering that I began bashing my head into things around the age of 10, it is quite unlikely that the mental decline could have started before then.
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Perhaps then a meaningful penalty?
And let the class members queue up themselves. Surely someone involved could whack up a website to get the info. Fraud? Turnabout may be fair play.
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How about making it like the lottery where a few people can get a decent amount?
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The author's didn't propose to settle for $8.5 million. The premise of the suit is that Google bought the lawyers off with a small sum of money (against the damage they done). He's trying to change this and arguing that the reward should predominantly go to the class, not the lawyers.
I'd argue in any class action where the lawyers get all the money that the company paid the lawyers to drop the suit rather than pursue actual damages against the corporation. Settlements like these are nothing more than bribes
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Soooooo..... (Score:1)
All of them?
When I receive one of those notices... (Score:2)
... that I can join a class action suit, I throw it away. Why get my hopes up that I might, some day, receive a check for something on the order of $0.17?
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Why get my hopes up that I might, some day, receive a check for something on the order of $0.17?
Or even better, a voucher for a discount on ${EVIL_COMPANY}'s product!!!
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And meanwhile, you give up your right to sue separately over the matter.
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I've gotten, I think, $17 and $40 from AT&T and someone else in recent years. It's usually worth a few minutes of your time.
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I write back and opt out. Fuck you guys, get some other placeholder class member....
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Then you're an idiot. You opt-out only if you plan to sue them yourself. Otherwise, there's no point. Yes, the terms of the settlement apply to you, including some kind of prohibition on suing about it in the future, if you don't opt out, but if you don't intend to then who cares? All you did was waste some time filling out a form and some postage sending it in (because it always has to be mailed, and being a legal document you do want certified mail).
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No, because it would also reduce money for the lawyers. There's only one pool of money at the end, and any amount you require to go to the victims is not available to go to the lawyers.
Really need to compensate the class, not lawyers (Score:1)
Too many times I see these settlements where the lawyers make what amounts to a sweetheart deal with the megacorp. The class members get next to nothing of value, the lawyers collect millions, and the megacorp gets off paying ultimately a fraction of a day's revenues, often not having to admit liability, and basically keeping all the rewards from their malfeasance.
If one follows the legal firms, or their principals, it seems like sometimes they also get some lucrative business from one of the megacorp's su
Not entirely about attorney's fees here. (Score:1)
It's my understanding that this hearing is about Cy Pres settlement distributions, not necessarily attorney's fees.
Briefly, a cy pres award is the distribution of money from a class action settlement to a charitable organization. [taken from google]. Sometimes, it would be hard to distribute any sort of settlement to that many google users (how do you identify them? Get them their money?). So, award goes to a charity that is related to that class action.
Most media articles about this case will probably i
Should be a percentage! (Score:2)
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Or $5 off your next $2000 purchase. (Score:2)
Supreme Court Scrutinizing Class Action Settlements That Leave Consumers Empty-Handed
A free small cone or fry coupon is not empty-handed!!!
bout time (Score:2)
class action lawsuits over the years, have only benefited the lawyers. while consumers get pennies or coupons, the lawyers get millions in cash. doubt anything will change, the lawyers will always win since they have all the money.
Class Action Money Redistribution (Score:2)
All in all, it's little more than a way for lawyers to milk money out of big corporations by using consumers as leverage on the wallets of said corporations.
Lawyers and legal fees.
What about compensation for the consumers?
Is that what the Supreme Court is actually looking into, or is it more like: Is it fair to bleed the corporations if no consumer gets compensation, and. therefore "wrong" to do so?
Just curious as to the reference to "fair" in this usage.