B&M purchasers of pre-recorded music products between 1995-2000 may receive up to $20
12-07-02, 03:49 AM
#3
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[Thread title edited for clarity: not just CDs and only retail purchases, not online]
The lawsuits, which are currently pending in the United States District Court for the District of Maine, relate to the retail pricing of prerecorded music compact discs, cassettes or vinyl albums (collectively known as prerecorded Music Products). [....] Defendants' combined cash payments total $67,375,000. [....] The cash paid by the Defendants, after the payment of attorneys' fees, litigation and Settlement administration costs, shall be distributed to consumers who purchased Music Products. The number of claims filed will determine the actual amount of the individual refund but will not exceed $20.00 per claimant. If the number of claims filed would result in refunds of less than $5.00 per claimant, there will be no cash distribution to individual consumers. Rather, the cash portion of the Settlement shall be distributed to not-for-profit, charitable, governmental or public entities to be used for music-related purposes or programs for the benefit of consumers who purchased Music Products.
IMPORTANT - If you are a member of the Settlement Group, you can only file one claim per person no matter how many Music Products you purchased.
IMPORTANT - If you are a member of the Settlement Group, you can only file one claim per person no matter how many Music Products you purchased.
12-07-02, 09:12 AM
#5
DVD Talk Hall of Fame
While this sounds good, this is the problem with class action lawsuits:
They are supposed to be on behalf of a class of people, ie, those who were wronged by whatever misprice or action occured/didnt' occur.
But:
"If the number of claims filed would result in refunds of less than $5.00 per claimant, there will be no cash distribution to individual consumers. Rather, the cash portion of the Settlement shall be distributed to not-for-profit, charitable, governmental or public entities to be used for music-related purposes or programs for the benefit of consumers who purchased Music Products. "
But guess who still gets their money, which is usually a [large] percent of the award? Yep, the lawyers--and they get it in cash. So the people for whom the case was originally brought get nothing, some possibly unrelated groups get a windfall, and the lawyers, as always, walk away winning.
If the issue is to punish the malefactor, I don't have a problem with that, just make that point [because either way they pay], but don't say this is to 'benefit the consumer' when the consumer never sees anything. In fact, the consumer generally gets screwed--do you think whomever the defendant is, has 65 million dollars floating around? Nope....they'll make it up by raising prices, cutting costs [ie, firing people or lowering wages] or maybe even eventually going out of business.
All this is to not to say that class action suits are necessarily bad, I just think sometimes the fine print results in the winner [consumer] losing, and the coaches [lawyers] winning a lot.
Randy Cassingham's True Stella Awards [www.stellaawards.com] has a sample issue on his website regarding something very similar http://www.stellaawards.com/sample.html ; A guy started a class action suit against Home Depot for not having everything marked with a price [the scanners were available to use] as was stated in state law. He started a class action suit asking for 25 dollars per 'victim'. HD settled for 3.8 million. They now have to price everything in each of their 33 stores, at an estimated cost of 20 million. The lawyers get about half that 3.8 million, and the rest goes to:
Habitat for Humanity ($1
million), the National Consumer Law Center ($100,000), the Friends of the
Shattuck Shelter ($50,000), a "consumer advocate" web site registered to
an individual, not a non-profit organization ($25,000), and a new entity
called the "Consumer Resource Fund" ($725,000)'
"Note that none of the money will go to Colman Herman, even though he's
listed as the "lead plaintiff", nor to any other members of the "Class"
(you know, the "victims" that were "affected" by Home Depot's actions).
Why not? Well, the Boston Globe newspaper reports, "apparently because
the damages per person are so small" -- at least, once all the non-
affected groups grab their share there's so little left that it would
cost too much to find the individual members of the Class."
"coughing up nearly $24 million -- which cost will, of
course, be passed on to consumers in the form of higher prices -- was
"the best possible outcome" it could think of. It not only got to make
"donations" to lawyers, housing and consumer groups, it found it politic
to express gratitude over the extortion."
And why did Herman initiate this lawsuit?
""It's fun," he says."
I apologize for the extreme length of this post; I realize a lot of people on this board are of the 'Fight the power! Mean companies!" mindset, [many of course are not], and while I'm not trying to be some company drone, it's important to think through these actions, and the results of these actions. Sometimes by winning, we lose.
They are supposed to be on behalf of a class of people, ie, those who were wronged by whatever misprice or action occured/didnt' occur.
But:
"If the number of claims filed would result in refunds of less than $5.00 per claimant, there will be no cash distribution to individual consumers. Rather, the cash portion of the Settlement shall be distributed to not-for-profit, charitable, governmental or public entities to be used for music-related purposes or programs for the benefit of consumers who purchased Music Products. "
But guess who still gets their money, which is usually a [large] percent of the award? Yep, the lawyers--and they get it in cash. So the people for whom the case was originally brought get nothing, some possibly unrelated groups get a windfall, and the lawyers, as always, walk away winning.
If the issue is to punish the malefactor, I don't have a problem with that, just make that point [because either way they pay], but don't say this is to 'benefit the consumer' when the consumer never sees anything. In fact, the consumer generally gets screwed--do you think whomever the defendant is, has 65 million dollars floating around? Nope....they'll make it up by raising prices, cutting costs [ie, firing people or lowering wages] or maybe even eventually going out of business.
All this is to not to say that class action suits are necessarily bad, I just think sometimes the fine print results in the winner [consumer] losing, and the coaches [lawyers] winning a lot.
Randy Cassingham's True Stella Awards [www.stellaawards.com] has a sample issue on his website regarding something very similar http://www.stellaawards.com/sample.html ; A guy started a class action suit against Home Depot for not having everything marked with a price [the scanners were available to use] as was stated in state law. He started a class action suit asking for 25 dollars per 'victim'. HD settled for 3.8 million. They now have to price everything in each of their 33 stores, at an estimated cost of 20 million. The lawyers get about half that 3.8 million, and the rest goes to:
Habitat for Humanity ($1
million), the National Consumer Law Center ($100,000), the Friends of the
Shattuck Shelter ($50,000), a "consumer advocate" web site registered to
an individual, not a non-profit organization ($25,000), and a new entity
called the "Consumer Resource Fund" ($725,000)'
"Note that none of the money will go to Colman Herman, even though he's
listed as the "lead plaintiff", nor to any other members of the "Class"
(you know, the "victims" that were "affected" by Home Depot's actions).
Why not? Well, the Boston Globe newspaper reports, "apparently because
the damages per person are so small" -- at least, once all the non-
affected groups grab their share there's so little left that it would
cost too much to find the individual members of the Class."
"coughing up nearly $24 million -- which cost will, of
course, be passed on to consumers in the form of higher prices -- was
"the best possible outcome" it could think of. It not only got to make
"donations" to lawyers, housing and consumer groups, it found it politic
to express gratitude over the extortion."
And why did Herman initiate this lawsuit?
""It's fun," he says."
I apologize for the extreme length of this post; I realize a lot of people on this board are of the 'Fight the power! Mean companies!" mindset, [many of course are not], and while I'm not trying to be some company drone, it's important to think through these actions, and the results of these actions. Sometimes by winning, we lose.
12-07-02, 09:39 AM
#6
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<small>
</small>The edited quote in my first post was selected precisely to highlight the downside to this case. My view was that anyone that read it could work out the implications.... 
so I let it speak for itself.
Originally posted by dtcarson
While this sounds good [....] I apologize for the extreme length of this post [....] it's important to think through these actions, and the results of these actions. Sometimes by winning, we lose.
While this sounds good [....] I apologize for the extreme length of this post [....] it's important to think through these actions, and the results of these actions. Sometimes by winning, we lose.
so I let it speak for itself.
