Appeals Court Slaps Down AT&T Arbitration Mouseprint

Your next!

This is another reason why a TOS should not be allowed to change during a term.

In a perfect world, there will be a point in the near future where some regulation is put into place that bans terms of service that are not readable by the average person in the time allotted. No more 4-foot-long receipts from Best Buy. No more 100-page booklets in your Time Warner bill. No more abuse of the consumer because just about everthing is a monopoly with more monetary and political power than the government. No mor eshjfdalkjhf xmmn

Oh, crap, sorry. I fell asleep. Must have been dreaming.

The medical industry should watch.

Kaiser Permanente has a similar clause in their HMO Insurance.

While all contract terms should be readable and not in obscure legalese, the mandatory arbitration clauses came about because of those opportunistic law firms that tended to file class action lawsuits at the drop of a hat and frequently without any reason other than greed. The costs of defending these suits became prohibitive and weren't in anyone's interest but the suing law firms. The so-called winners in a class action suit were NEVER those on whose behalf the suits were filed.

This was covered on other news sites several months ago.

What AT&T did may have been covered on other new sites several months ago, but the ruling was filed August 17, 2007. Far from being "old news".

Like ComCAST invented the arbitration clause.

It would be a painful task to try to find business of any size that doesn't have the arbitration clause. Anyone that has a credit card should know that...

So then what you are saying is that anytime you buy something from a company that provides you something, it should just be anything goes? no contracts? and what's the "time allotted?"

Like it or not, the contracts are written in the very same legal terms that EVERY citizen lives under. The fact that people don't want to take the time to read what they are getting into with an entity in a business relationship is no reason to toss out contracts or terms of service. The TOS, like them or not, are not going away, and they are not going to be dumbed down so that people can be lazy. Plain English is vague and isn't very easy to hold up in court because of interpretation. When a problem occurs, the contract or terms are based on law that a court, where the problem would wind up, is going to sort out.

I'm sorry to say that I do not agree with you in the least that things should be in plain English or that there should be no long books that make up agreements. I refuse to dumb down America for those that are too lazy. It will cause nothing but problems.. not to mention, the last time I read a comcast TOS agreement, it IS written in plain English. Further, people cry all the time that "they didn't know" this or that... well? That's why there are TOS agreements.. only no one cares to read them until its too late.

I DO, however, no agree with arbitration clauses.. (only other than to the reason TCH stated below about opportunistic law firms) I have NEVER EVER agreed with the signing/agreeing away of your rights of a citizen of the United States to not be able to file a complaint against another person or entity when they have done wrong. This nation was founded on law and order and to allow arbitration... that's un-American.

But TOS agreements can stay.

This is why Castro kicked these idiots out of Cuba. He asked them to play fair and not exploit the people or resources. They chose not to agree so bye bye. I think the govt should temp suspend them from any fcc auctions.

Then the courts should have been slapping the opportunistic lawyers instead of giving companies a new kind of power. T

Though you are right in that the only real winners in a class action lawsuit are the participating lawyers.

The ruling was announced long ago making it old news. Just because it was actually filed today on record doesnt mean it was just announced today.

Why? Such an action would reduce the need for more judges.

And why would more judges be in the interest of existing judges?

Sure. But it was filed 8/17, making it news. Tada.

Because all judges above the district justice / justice of the peace level must be lawyers.

More lawyers in positions of power (judges) the more power lawyers have.

More judges means more power for the judges in power all ready...

I can't speak to ATT's reasoning, but I've been following news about Comcast for a few years now, and I'm not aware of even one class-action mighty enough that could cause Comcast to amend their terms. Can you cite any?

I got the COMCAST TOS in my last bill. I wrote on my check to them that I did not accept the language of their TOS with some addtional legal stuff. It would be interesting to see if they cashed my check and accepted my language. Am waiting on a copy of the cleared check to arrive in the monthly bank statement. Stay tuned.

w/e DSLReports reports news only when they think it is. CNN and Washington Post had this when it was first ruled.

We only have ourselves to blame for the legal disclaimers longer than your average book. If it weren't for idiots using hairdryers in the bathtub or suing for millions on spilled coffee, we wouldn't be inundated with this crap. Yet, thanks to your village idiots, companies have long legal mumbo jumbo to protect themselves. While I disagree with this clause of arbitration, I can at least see where they are coming from. They want to avoid a disasterous lawsuit, which in the end, gets offset by its members. It's a catch 22 in the real sense. Even though I think their intentions are good (for the most part), no company should be immune from bad conduct. Hence, this is where you draw the fine line between protecting the consumer and not screwing the company. That is where it gets tricky, and I think a more acceptable balance must be found, than some forced arbitration. Some suggestions might include a nonbinding mediator to help resolve disputes, in order to prevent them from turning "legal". One other idea might be to treat customers better. Whatever the choice, this decision to force arbitration is definitely overzealous. I applaud the courts for recognizing this fact.

Why bother playing games? The insert told you how to opt out.

Like it or not, the contracts are written in the very same legal terms that EVERY citizen lives under. The fact that people don't want to take the time to read what they are getting into with an entity in a business relationship is no reason to toss out contracts or terms of service. The TOS, like them or not, are not going away, and they are not going to be dumbed down so that people can be lazy. Plain English is vague and isn't very easy to hold up in court because of interpretation. When a problem occurs, the contract or terms are based on law that a court, where the problem would wind up, is going to sort out.

You say that like the current system is actually working well or has some kind of intrinsic property that makes it the only way to achieve a balance. Neither are true. The assumption that plain english must be deficient in terms of legal structure, or even that the statements that must be understood and agreed to on simple transactions is just ludicrous. You cannot assume within the realm of sanity that every individual is both educated within the terms of legal jargon and is up to date on local/state/federal law that such a contract would be interpreted under. We are talking about contract terms that fall within the monetary bounds of small claims here. Unnecessarily complicated requirements for transactions that are largely a requirement of daily life for 90%+ of the populous only creates more fodder for the legal system to grow into a large and more sycophantic monster than it already is.

This type of attitude will see us all toting lawyers around on daily errands. Not to mention is it damn near unilaterally in favor of supporting corporations with large budgets continually looking for way to suppress and chip away at the basics of functional social contracts. It is extremely basic that both parties of a contract are able to view and understand the terms to which they have agreed. Without that understanding, or often referred to as 'meeting of the minds' there is not basis for a contract.

The nation may have been founded on law and order but it has very little to do with it's current situation. Anyone without the ways and means to support an extended court case has lost before it was begun regardless of the facts at hand. Reinforce corporate strangleholds if you like, I prefer to remember that America is a nation founded on recognizing the rights of all individuals, or at least it used to be.

And I see interesting articles and "News" on here which never make it on CNN and into the Washington Post. So?

You really believe that crap??? Castro kicked them out because he wants full control of everything in his country. Just like what Chavez is attempting to do with his country now.

You can't be serious. Castro does more to exploit his own people than any corporation could dream of.

Which bill was that. I don't open my Comcast bill, I always pay online. How do I opt out? I don't even know if I still have my last bill.

I wonder what the total impact of this will be. I know credit card companies, cell phone, and others use mouse-print disclaimers like this.

I just got my most recent bill 2 days ago, so it was the one before that. If you go back into the article, the link is there for you to opt out. Since the article said something about only having 30 days to respond (and I forgot about it unitl now), I just put in a date from less than 30 days ago where they asked when I received the notice. No problems.

This is the most overturned court in the country. Arbitration is both legal and standard practice. I believe this ruling will be overturned by the Supreme Court.

Does this mean you don't sign them? How can you avoid them, as ubiquitous as they are.

I sign them (or tacitly agree to them via my continued use of XYZ service). Believe me, I hate them, but I usually opt to sign up for the service anyway.

I -heart- the 9th Circuit Court -- a big win for the consumer!