On July 20, 2009, the office of Attorney General Lori Swanson of the State of Minnesota announced a settlement with the National Arbitration Forum (NAF). The State of Minnesota brought suit against the NAF because the NAF had financial and ownership interests aligned with the corporate consumer credit interests bringing matters before arbitrators of the NAF. As a result of the Attorney General’s lawsuit, the NAF agreed to “get out of the business of arbitrating credit card and other consumer collection disputes.” (See Press release from the Office of the Attorney General Lori Swanson dated July 20, 2009; http://www.ag.state.mn.us/Consumer/PressRelease/090720NationalArbitrationAgremnt.asp.)
It is obvious that this settlement will have a huge affect on the results of countless arbitration decisions. Even those arbitration decisions appropriately awarding money to the credit card companies are now not to be believed. The NAF has been exposed as a biased organization that was holding itself out to the public as “A forum Dispute Management Organization” that in fact was an organization with a financial interest in the outcome of the many disputes it was managing.
As people who were wronged by the NAF find legal counsel and bring lawsuits against the NAF and the creditors who benefited from the NAF conduct, some of the wrongs will be righted. But what is going to become of the individual arbitrators who must have done the bidding of the NAF in order to bring about these unfair arbitration decisions? So far I have not seen any arbitrators publically identified who performed arbitrations on behalf of the NAF. But, inevitably, individual reputations of arbitrators will be affected by the fall out of the NAF’s conduct.
This website information is not intended to provide legal advice, as each situation is different and specific factual information must be obtained before an attorney is able to assess the legal questions relevant to your situation. In addition to providing related information, this blog may also be considered an advertisement for legal services.
If you or someone you know has lost such an arbitration and wish to fight back against a party that wronged you unfairly, please contact our firm for a free consultation and information regarding your rights as a consumer. To contact the author, Attorney Steve Randall directly, please send an email to srandall@prslegal.com, or call any of the attorneys at Pearson, Randall, Schumacher & LaBore, P.A. at 612-767-7500.

While lawmakers in Congress are passing bills attempting to reform the credit card industry, consumers are taking action through public and private attorneys on another aspect of credit abuses.

One company that has attracted controversy and is presently subject to lawsuits is the National Arbitration Forum, or NAF. The National Arbitration Forum, headquartered in Minneapolis, Minnesota, provides arbitration and mediation services to businesses, including credit card companies and related financial institutions, cell phone providers, wireless service providers and even nursing homes or employment situations.

Credit issuers often place mandatory arbitration clauses in their terms or contracts for providing services to consumers. This means that consumers are forced to use the arbitration system and procedure set out by that fine print of terms or contracts. These conditions require consumers to sign away consumers’ right to sue in a court of law for disputes. To add to this impact, there is now evidence being revealed that the processes used by the credit issuers or employers through the National Arbitration Forum, NAF, were not fair to consumers.

The National Arbitration Forum, NAF, is frequently used as the exclusive entity to act as the arbitrator by many businesses. As one of the largest alternative dispute resolution providers in the nation, the National Arbitration Forum, NAF, has recently been sued by the Minnesota Attorney General’s office and a quick settlement is pending. After being sued by the MN Attorney General, a public attorney for the state, on July 14, 2009, NAF agreed to quit arbitrating disputes for now. To understand the claims against NAF, review a copy of the pending lawsuit in the public sector against the National Arbitration Forum at: http://www.ag.state.mn.us/PDF/PressReleases/SignedFiledComplaintArbitrationCompany.pdf

Lawsuits are forming by both the public sector of the attorney generals in states with consumer protection laws, but also in the private sector by dedicated attorneys that represent consumers.To learn more about the breaking story, see also: http://www.businessweek.com/bwdaily/dnflash/content/jul2009/db20090714_952766.htm

This website information is not intended to provide legal advice, as each situation is different and specific factual information must be obtained before an attorney is able to assess the legal questions relevant to your situation. In addition to providing related information, this blog may also be considered an advertisement for legal services.

If you or someone you know has lost such an arbitration and wish to fight back against a party that wronged you unfairly, please contact our firm for a free consultation and information regarding your rights as a consumer. To contact the author, Attorney Nicole L. Kreklau directly, please send an email to nkreklau@prslegal.com, or call any of the attorneys at Pearson, Randall, Schumacher & LaBore, P.A. at 612-767-7500.