| Volume 143 Number 78 |
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The People’s Lawyer’s Tip of the Day
If you want to contact a company’s customer service department, you can do a quick search online and often find what looks like its phone number or email. But is the information at the top of your search results actually correct? Click here for more.
Uber Eats bookings have doubled during the pandemic, company reports
In its second quarter earnings results, Uber said its food delivery service, Uber Eats, more than doubled its orders during the first months of the pandemic.
The ride-hailing giant said Thursday that its reported net loss was $1.78 billion in the second quarter of 2020. That’s down from its net loss of $5.24 billion a year ago. However, Uber revealed that it topped analyst expectations in terms of revenue, hitting above the $2.18 billion figure investors expected. Click here for more.
Your Money
Sales tax holidays date back to 1980 when Ohio and Michigan offered residents a one-time chance to skip sales tax on automobile purchases, according to the nonprofit Tax Foundation. However, in recent years, they have become an annual event in more than a dozen states. Here are the 16 states offering back-to-school tax-free days in 2020: Click here for more.
For the Lawyers
Arbitrator’s decision to conduct class arbitration cannot be vacated. If a federal court decides the class arbitration issue, then the proponent of class arbitration should lose, unless the arbitration agreement explicitly provides for class arbitration. But if the arbitration agreement commits that “gateway” issue to an arbitrator and the arbitrator permits class arbitration, then the parties almost certainly will be held to that decision, even if the decision is later demonstrated to be wrong. An hourly employee of Sun Coast Resources, initiated an arbitration proceeding against Sun Coast under the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA), claiming he was denied overtime pay. Under the terms of an arbitration clause in the employment agreement between Mr. Conrad and Sun Coast, he brought his FLSA claim on behalf of a class of similarly-situated employees. After an arbitrator was appointed, he issued a “clause construction award,” in which he concluded that “the agreement ... clearly provides for collective actions.” Sun Coast then filed an application with the Southern District of Texas, seeking to vacate the award under Section § 10(a)(4) of the Federal Arbitration Act (FAA) (9 U.S.C. § 10(a)(4)). The district court denied the application, ruling that the arbitrator did not exceed his powers because he simply interpreted the contract. Sun Coast appealed and the Fifth Circuit affirmed. The key point, according to the Fifth Circuit, was that the parties’ arbitration agreement authorized the arbitrator to interpret the agreement, and that is what he did. Whether he was correct (or not) was beside the point: “The correctness of the arbitrator’s interpretation is irrelevant so long as it was an interpretation.” Sun Coast Resources, Inc. v. Conrad, 956 F.3d. 335 (5th Cir. 2020). Click here for more.