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Mandatory Arbitration Sucks

Bank of America Drops Mandatory Arbitration Clause

August 13, 2009

Bank of America just announced that it will no longer require consumers to arbitrate disputes concerning credit cards and other consumer accounts. Great news! The collapse of pre-dispute, mandatory binding arbitration continues. Hopefully other credit grantors will follow suit.
Bank of America ends arbitration of card disputes | Reuters

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Credit CARD Act goes far beyond the Fed’s credit card regs

May 28, 2009

According to an editorial in last Friday’s Washington Post,  the credit card bill that the President signed into law that afternoon “isn’t really needed” because it is “awfully similar” to the regulations on credit cards that were issued by the Federal Reserve last December.
Wrong!
In fact, the new law is remarkably broader and stronger than the [...]

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Forced Arbitration: You Can’t Sue Us For Discrimination

April 30, 2009

Why you should support the Arbitration Fairness Act. Forced Arbitration: You Can’t Sue Us For Discrimination | Consumerist

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Today Is Arbitration Fairness Day!

April 29, 2009

Call your representatives and tell them mandatory binding arbitration sucks! Today Is Arbitration Fairness Day! | Consumer Law & Policy Blog

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Mandatory Binding Arbitration: The Worst Choose Your Own Adventure Ever

February 10, 2009

This is one of the best-executed blog posts, ever, about arbitration or anything else. Mandatory Binding Arbitration: The Worst Choose Your Own Adventure Ever | Consumerist

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Minnesota Courts to Stop Handling Debt Collection Lawsuits?

January 15, 2009

Possibly, along with other “low-importance” cases like shoplifting, traffic violations, trespassing, and small claims, if the legislature delivers the 10% cut to court funding that it has suggested it will. Minnesota courts have been short-staffed and under-funded for years, and further cuts could mean that the judicial system starts to shut down some services.
While I [...]

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It’s a wonderful mortgage crisis

December 24, 2008

Newsweek analyzes the mortgage crisis though the lens of my favorite holiday movie.  For those who don’t know the story, Frank Capra’s masterpiece is a film about overcoming greed through the power of friendship (with a little help from spirituality), family and love.
I wish I had a million dollars – hot dog!
It’s A Wonderful Mortgage Crisis [...]

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Profiles in bankruptcy: Abraham Lincoln

October 3, 2008

Brad Perri is a Minnesota bankruptcy lawyer who will be guest blogging at Caveat Emptor from September 29th through October 10th.
Welcome to another installment in Profiles in Bankruptcy!
Today’s vignette finds us in a grocery store on the prairie where a young man has invested himself in becoming a grocer.
Unfortunately, this young man doesn’t quite have [...]

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Olympus phone recording device makes it easy to record phone calls

July 25, 2008

The Olympus TP-7 Telephone Recording Device (clever name, eh?) is probably the easiest way to record phone calls (from an abusive debt collector, for example) that I have seen. You stick it in your ear, plug it into a recorder, hold your phone normally up against your ear with the earbud in it, and it [...]

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Credit card tricks and traps to avoid

July 14, 2008

Some of the “tricks and traps” in AFFIL’s Common Credit Cards Tricks and Traps (PDF link) are impossible to avoid. Or nearly so at least. I can’t think of a credit card agreement that does not include a mandatory binding arbitration clause, for example.
But some cards are better than others. When you are looking for [...]

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More on how arbitration screws consumers from Elizabeth Warren

June 11, 2008

More on how arbitration screws consumers from Elizabeth Warren. Have You Already Lost? | TPMCafé

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Banks vs. Consumers (Guess Who Wins)

June 7, 2008

“The business of resolving credit-card disputes is booming. But critics say the dominant firm favors creditors that are trying to collect from unsophisticated debtors” Banks vs. Consumers (Guess Who Wins) [BusinessWeek]

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Arbitration news roundup

June 5, 2008

Last week was quite a week for arbitration. Here was all the arbitration news that popped up here on Caveat Emptor:

Mandatory binding arbitration sucks (say 81% of Americans). Taking a look at the U.S. Chamber of Commerce study on mandatory binding arbitration.
National Arbitration Forum thinks courts should just rubber stamp arbitration awards. NAF on getting [...]

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ABC News: National Arbitration Forum is selling justice

May 29, 2008

Maybe the tide is starting to change. ABC News’ Good Morning America show’s piece on what a scam mandatory arbitration is for credit cards is great.
Among its highlights are a women who was harassed and sued for some one else’s debt, and a judge who was black balled for deciding in the consumer’s favor once. [...]

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Consumers in California lose 99% of the time

May 29, 2008

ABC News did a great piece on debt collection, arbitration, and especially the National Arbitration Forum, where consumers in California lose 99% of the time. A former NAF arbitrator says on camera that she was forced to quit for ruling in favor of a consumer one time. Stick around for the great commentary at the [...]

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National Arbitration Forum thinks courts should just rubber stamp arbitration awards

May 29, 2008

National Arbitration Forum basically offers a rubber stamp to debt collectors already, and they argue that courts should turn their awards into court judgments without looking too closely.
Are courts unreasonably tossing out arbitration awards? Nope. NAF is just advocating for its clients, the debt collectors, who have no proof of the debts on which they [...]

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Mandatory binding arbitration sucks (say 81% of Americans)

May 27, 2008

81% of Americans polled in a recent study commissioned by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce disapproved of mandatory binding arbitration. This is the corporation-friendly, tie-your-hands arbitration that is written into most of the consumer contracts we sign every day for credit cards, cell phones, etc.
So maybe it is time for Congress to get going and [...]

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Perpetual arbitration with National Arbitration Forum

April 30, 2008

I learned a curious fact in the course of an arbitration proceeding with the National Arbitration Forum. Once either party obtains a stay of the arbitration, the opposing party has 15 days to file an objection. After that 15 days is up, apparently only the party that requested the stay can lift it.
In other words, [...]

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U.S. Chamber of Commerce fudges the issue on arbitration

April 6, 2008

We have not mentioned the Arbitration Fairness Act in some time, but the AFA is still pending before Congress, and Big Business is still trying to stop it.
What is the issue? Mandatory binding arbitration. Nobody thinks arbitration is a problem when two parties agree to it. The problem is that many businesses (your credit card [...]

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Mortgage securitizers fiddle as Rome burns

February 7, 2008

The NYTimes has a piece on the 5th Annual Conference of the American Securitization Forum held in Las Vegas. These are the guys who played a major role in bring us the current foreclosure mess. Well while the rest of the country and the world for that matter mucks its way out of the mess [...]

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