soren wrote:
PA12DRVR wrote:
This topic is laden with a bunch of horsefeathers.
...but don't assert that binding arbitration is "breaking the law" or "giving up your rights".....by signing that sales agreement, the purchase AGREED to binding arbitration. If the purchaser didn't read the fine print, how is that characterized as "giving up your rights"?
All of that being said, when I was active in the game, we always recommended that commercial contracts use mediation followed by litigation as the dispute resolution mechanism. Arbitration is a bit of the worst of both worlds: lacking many of the procedural protections and settled law aspects of litigation while having expense and time costs far in excess of informal dispute resolution.
LOL. You can't even agree with yourself. Yes, binding arbitration is giving up your right to due process, and you are well aware of that fact. As evidenced by your final paragraph. Given strong lemon law protection in my state, I have little interest is the unlikely event of dealing with arbitration during a vehicle purchase, but there are many other, more significant transactions, where I simply isn't something I would be willing to expose myself to. It's a fraudulent set up that protects the guilty, and prevents meaningful reform when used to protect corporations from deliberately and repeatedly harming the public.
I'll stack my legal knowledge against yours any day. In an arms-length commercial transaction, neither party is being deprived of life, liberty, or property (i.e. such deprivations require due process) as the parties are bargaining for an exchange. If that arms-length commercial transaction BECOMES A DISPUTE then certain due process of law provisions kick in regarding the resolution of that DISPUTE, but , the first thing the adjudicator will look at is the agreement between the parties. If that agreement nominates binding arbitration, then the parties have selected binding arbitration as part of the bargained-for-exchange and there has been no unwilling deprivation.
"Giving up your right to due process" for binding arbitration is no more "giving up" than you "give up" your money when you buy a car. It's a bargained-for exchange. The fact that it is not a dispute resolution mechanism that I would recommend to two parties with equal bargaining power doesn't mean that the binding arbitration provisions of a car sales contract THAT THE PURCHASER AGREES TO are fraudulent or illegal or in need of reform. If a purchaser is unwilling to read the sales agreement, they should bear the consequences thereof. If the state of the transaction has "strong lemon law" provisions, those provisions will have an impact on the dispute and will place obligations on both parties (although more on the dealership) and such obligations cannot be set aside nor waived by either an arbitrator nor a judge. A contract cannot set aside the law and a close examination of most sales contracts will lead to the savings clause which provides for any provisions not in compliance with the law to be rendered moot while leaving the rest of the contract in force.
Want to eliminate binding arbitration? Petition the legislative body of the city or state that you are a resident of to make such provisions illegal or petition for stronger laws against contracts that appear like contracts of adhesion. Don't like binding arbitration as a result of buying a car? Buy a car from a private party.
