I have saved up six opinions that considered whether to vacate an arbitration award over the summer.* Only one of those opinions vacated the award; the other five confirmed. To get a flavor of what types of arguments are winning and losing motions to vacate, here is a summary of those six.
Vacated
The lone
Almost two years ago in American Express Co. v. Italian Colors, SCOTUS significantly narrowed, but did not overrule, the “effective vindication” doctrine, which allows plaintiffs to invalidate an arbitration agreement if it precludes them from effectively vindicating their federal statutory rights. A decision today from the Eighth Circuit shows just how difficult it is
What’s one way to derail a potentially large collective action about Fair Labor Standards Act violations? To implement a new arbitration policy within days, thereby ensuring that your current employees cannot join the court case. At least, that was the successful tactic used by a Chicago restaurant recently.
In Conners v. Gusano’s Chicago Style Pizzeria,
One year ago, the NLRB ruled in D.R. Horton, Inc. that it is a violation of federal labor law for employers to require their employees to sign arbitration agreements waiving class actions, and that any arbitration agreements waiving class arbitration would be void. This week, the Eighth Circuit became the first federal circuit
Two circuit court decisions in the last week have denied arbitration motions based on the lack of an arbitration agreement between the parties. These decisions show that while the federal presumption in favor of arbitration is generally a strong current, it is not strong enough to pull non-signatories into arbitration (or even to stay their
In an opinion that runs less than three pages, the Eighth Circuit ruled that a managing broker-dealer is not obligated under the FINRA rules to arbitrate with a group of investors who purchased securities from another party. Berthel Fisher & Co. Fin. Servs., Inc. v. Larmon, __ F.3d. __, 2012 WL 4477433 (8th
Relying on the Rent-A-Center decision, the Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals issued a decision today that construed the parties’ relevant arbitration agreement very narrowly, thereby ducking a decision about whether the larger “disputes” section of the contract was void under state law. That makes the Eighth Circuit the first federal court to do exactly what