Have you waived your right to a trial?

Jennifer Moore

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Do you read the fine print in contracts? Do you read the fine print when you sign up for a credit card? What about when you sign up for a cell phone? If you don't, you may have just waived your right to trial. The fine print may contain a mandatory arbitration provision. In other words, if your rights have been violated or you are wronged by the company, you won't be able to bring suit in court. Your only option may be to file a claim with an arbitration panel. Public Citizen, a non-profit consumer interest group, studied mandatory arbitration extensively over an eight-month period and recently released a reporton the effects of these waivers and mandatory arbitration provisions. The results show that mandatory arbitration provisions favor business and not the consumer.

Stunning Results that Disfavor Consumers: In the more than 19,000 cases in which an NAF-appointed arbitrator was involved, 94 percent of decisions were for business.

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Today, just about every American who has a credit card, builds a house, has a cell phone, gets a job or buys a computer has likely unknowingly agreed to settle any dispute through binding mandatory arbitration (BMA), a for-profit backroom process of settling disputes. This report takes a close look at the credit card industry's abuse of BMA and provides a chilling account of a stealth campaign by big business to undermine the ability of ordinary Americans to seek justice in court.