Archive for October, 2007

Among all the other things on my plate, I plan to participate in NaNoWriMo, a one-month novel writing marathon. Participants must write a novel (defined broadly as “a lengthy work of fiction”) of 50,000 words or more entirely during the month of November, National Novel Writing Month. Winners (those who finish) get a nice certificate.
I’m [...]

In an effort to give utility customers an incentive to pay their bills on time, CenterPoint Energy will begin reporting data on its delinquent customers beginning in January. CenterPoint says this will benefit timely payers. This is true. It will obviously hurt the credit rating of those who fall behind on their utility payments.
Excel Energy [...]

Last Thursday, the House Judiciary Committee’s Subcommittee on Commercial and Administrative Law held its second hearing on H.R. 3010 (PDF link), Rep. Hank Johnson’s Arbitration Fairness Act. A number of consumer blogs have posted reactions. Rather rehash them all, here are links to some of the best content:

Paul Bland at CL&P Blog gives a fairly [...]

Debt collection attorney Gary Nitzkin in Michigan says “[m]y best advice to debt buyers . . . DON’T DO IT.” Don’t sue, in other words. Why? Pretty much for the reasons I have addressed here, plus a few more:

Debt buyers don’t have the documentation they need to prove their case;
Other collection agencies already failed to [...]

I visited my local Wells Fargo branch at the beginning of September to open a new checking account. I also requested a check card (of course). Apparently, the banker missed the “send check card” button on his screen and instead clicked the “open a new credit card account” button, instead. And so, a few days [...]

Now available for public consumption in Minnesota is a set of forms for use in debt buyer lawsuits. While these forms will not be appropriate for every debt buyer lawsuit, they should help consumers answer the generic complaints used by most debt collection law firms in Minnesota.
Right now, debt collection law firms are “default mills.” [...]

A debt buyer is a person or company that owns a consumer debt but is not the original creditor. A debt buyer lawsuit is a lawsuit brought by a debt buyer to collect a consumer debt from a consumer.

In Hennepin County, Minnesota, it costs $252 for both parties in a lawsuit (in other words, the plaintiff pays $252 to file a complaint, and the defendant pays $252 to file an answer).
If either party wants a jury, they must pay an additional $75. (Either a judge or jury may decide questions of fact.)
Filing fees [...]

Senator Amy Klobuchar’s Cell Phone Consumer Empowerment Act of 2007 is moving along, gaining media attention, and perhaps gaining some traction, as well.
For more on the particulars, see this post.
[photo: Freerange]

National Arbitration Forum recently posted a news item from Twin Cities Business Magazine to its blog in which several lawyers made glowing recommendations of arbitration. Readers should make a careful distinction between elective arbitration–where two parties decide to arbitrate rather than litigate a dispute–and mandatory arbitration, where one or both parties has no choice but [...]

Jammie Thomas filed the first post-trial motion in her efforts to overturn the $222,000 verdict. The motion argues that the verdict was “grossly excessive,” because the verdict was more than 1,000 times whatever actual damages–assuming any damages at all–were “suffered” by the record companies.
[via Recording Industry vs The People]

Okay, I don’t know for certain that any of the hundreds of arbitration awards NAF arbitrator Joseph Nardulli rendered were bogus, but it’s a good bet several of them were.
Kind of like the case of Irene Lieber, in which NAF awarded $46,000 to MBNA even though Lieber never even got a copy of the claim, [...]

The Arbitration Fairness Act is legislation sponsored by Senator Russ Feingold (D-WI) that would eliminate mandatory binding arbitration in consumer contracts. Instead, the act introduces the novel idea that if consumers want to give up their right to use the legal system, they should be able to do so intelligently once the actual legal dispute [...]

Following on this post, Wired reports that T-Mobile failed in its efforts to compel the plaintiff to participate in binding arbitration rather than litigate his claims as a class action in court.
Mandatory binding arbitration in cases like this is cheaper for corporations and prohibitively expensive for consumers, especially when the damages at stake are so [...]

I’m a day and a half late, but you can watch live webcasts of the FTC hearings on consumer debt collection. You will also be able to read transcripts of the hearings.

Real Estate Disposition Corporation, a California company, will auction 325 homes at the Minneapolis Convention Center this weekend. The Pioneer Press calls it “another troubling sign of the times.”
The mass foreclosure auction is actually a revival of sorts. They were also popular following the savings and loan collapse in the late 1980s.
I have to wonder [...]

I just got hooked on NBC’s new show, Chuck an awesome, funny geek-becomes-reluctant spy (I know, what?) show. Since I can rarely make it to the television for any show reliably, I have been keeping up online. And don’t get me wrong, I’m thrilled that the networks are making their shows available online. But HOLY [...]

When it comes to debt collection, Joseph Nardulli is a king despot among arbitrators. Nardulli is an arbitrator for National Arbitration Forum who has rendered a mind-blowing 977 arbitration awards, mostly on MBNA accounts, and mostly to Wolpoff & Abramson, one of the busiest debt collector law firms in the country. (Currently, Wolpoff & Abramson [...]

Trent Reznor just announced that Nine Inch Nails is going solo and cutting out the middle man so that he can have a “a direct relationship with the audience as I see fit and appropriate.”
[via Gizmodo]

First, and most importantly, Virgin v. Thomas is obviously far from over. The jury returned a ridiculous verdict for the recording industry: $222,000 for 24 songs. Now, the case will move to post-trial motions and appeals. It will be a while before we know the real outcome.
$222,000 for 24 songs that the recording industry never [...]