$4MM TCPA SETTLEMENT: Another Seven Figure TCPA Settlement Haunts BigLaw as Truist Agrees to Pay Big Bucks

Repeat after me:

Hire big law. Expect a big loss.

Indeed you can’t even say “big loss” without “big law.” Its built into the words.

Its the same script every time.

Big law gets assigned the case. They litigate it for years charging god knows how much. Eventually get to a place where they realize they can’t win. So they recommend settlement on a classwide basis for millions of dollars.

Just terrible.

The latest victim of this ongoing TCPAWorld phenomenon is Truist Bank. They trusted a biglaw firm to help guide them through a TCPA class action in North Carolina against the powerful Keith Keogh and, well, it didn’t end up going very well.

It went so poorly, in fact, that Truist agreed to pay over $4mm to resolve the claims of just 5,998 class members per the Court’s preliminary approval order.

That means Truist agreed to pay about $666.00–look at that number– per class member in a TCPA settlement a RIDICULOUS over payment on a per-class member basis. (Pre-certification TCPA class actions like this should settle for well under $100.00 per head– and the Czar’s class settlements are usually down under $20.00 per person (look it up!!!).)

Its all about the counsel you choose folks.

The class definition here is very telling and suggests the parties cooked it up based on class data sets of Truist’s choosing:

The subscribers or regular users of the 5,998 telephone numbers assigned to cellular telephone service in the United States to which Truist placed a prerecorded telephone call concerning an unrelated account between February 10, 2019, and August 31, 2022

Compare this to the original class definitions in the complaint:

All persons subscribing to a telephone number assigned to cellular
telephone service in the United States to which Defendant placed a
prerecorded telephone call concerning an unrelated account since
the date that is four years prior to the filing of this complaint.

All persons subscribing to a telephone number assigned to cellular
telephone service in the United States to which Defendant placed
prerecorded telephone calls concerning at least two unrelated
accounts since the date that is four years prior to the filing of this
complaint

Night and day.

Wonder if anyone will object? Hmmm.

I understand Truist was looking for the lowest number they could get to here–hence the odd class definition– but there is just no value to this settlement at all in my opinion. Just a waste of millions of dollars.

But this is how it is.

Big law just can’t seem to win class certification motions. So they settle pre-certification or lose the certification effort and let firms with real firepower like Troutman Amin, LLP step in to clean it up. It is SO MUCH EASIER (and less expensive) for us to handle the case from the start folks instead of having to clean things up after the fact. But.. it is what it is.

And what it is, is reality.

Truist pays $4.1MM to settle with Keogh. #Biglaw strikes again. And the TCPAWorld keeps turning.

For those of you who want tips and pointers (and CLE credit and a good time!) make sure to get your tickets to the Law Conference of Champions III! TICKET PRICES RISE ON FRIDAY–SO GET IN NOW!)

Chat soon.