Arbitration Retreat Continues: Bank of America Surrenders
The WSJ Law Blog has this story about Bank of America deciding to no longer enforce arbitration clauses contained in customer agreements. The article states:
Bank of America, based in Charlotte, N.C., is the first major bank to announce that it is withdrawing from all mandatory arbitrations in consumer-related businesses. Other banks previously have said they are studying their policies.
“We think arbitration is a very fair way to resolve the issue. A lot of our customers did not feel the same way, so we decided to make a change,” said a Bank of America spokeswoman.
In July, JPMorgan Chase, one of the nation’s largest credit-card issuers, announced it would no longer submit disputes to arbitration and was reevaluating the inclusion of arbitration provisions in its consumer contracts.
All the news comes in the wake of congressional testimony on arbitration as well as a Minnesota Attorney General’s agreement in which the National Arbitration Forum decided to stop hearing consumer arbitration cases.
It's like French generals have taken over the defense of arbitration agreements. We surrender!! We surrender!!
