Tinder Hit With False Ad. Class Action Over Bait and Switch Tactics

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Tinder, Inc. was hit with a class action lawsuit by a California man who claims that the company engaged in “a classic bait and switch” by luring users into what was advertised as a free service and then charging a fee for the service to continue knowing they’d be hooked.

Plaintiff Billy Warner alleges in the Tinder class action lawsuit filed March 6 that he was deceived into thinking that the dating-app was free before the company allegedly changed its business model to a subscription based service at the beginning of March.

Warner explains in the class action lawsuit that he downloaded the Tinder app onto his iPhone in 2014.

“[Tinder] lets you find people who are within a certain radius of where you are located. You can see the profile pictures of people and their interests, and then qualify YES or NO,” Tinder says in promotions for the app.

“If both qualify positive, Tinder enables a chat room to communicate with the person,” the promotion continues.

“With Tinder you can have casual dating, meet the love of your life, or make friends. You Decide!”

Tinder also says that the app “is free and is available on iPhone and Android phones.”

Tinder customers sign up via their Facebook accounts, and the app uses information from each person’s Facebook account to develop a Tinder profile. It includes the person’s first name, age, pictures as well as any pages a person has “liked” on Facebook.

Users have the option to like or pass on the potential matches they are presented with. Tinder users swipe left to “like” someone and “right” to pass on someone.

According to the Tinder class action lawsuit, Tinder advertised itself as entirely free in numerous places.

“Tinder has, up until now, allowed users to enjoy unlimited free swipes and has been a free app,” Warner contends. “Tinder has never advertised, represented, or otherwise indicated to its customers, including plaintiff, that the use of its services will require any form or payment.”

The Tinder class action lawsuit alleges that the dating-app company “offered these free services with the goal in mind of enlisting a user base of tens or hundreds of millions of users, with the ultimate goal of later changing the rules of participation and deceptively and forcibly migrating a substantially percentage of its user base to a paid subscription model.”

Warner says that he believed he was “paying” for the app by allowing third party advertisers to display banner ads in the app, as is the case in other social media websites.

However, on March 2, Tinder informed customers that they “would no longer be able to utilize Tinder for the functions which consumers had previously enjoyed free use.”

The California man explains in his Tinder deceptive marketing class action lawsuit that he and other customers were told at that time that to continue Tinder use with “unlimited swipes” they would have to sign up for a Tinder Plus account, which costs $2.99 per month.

“[Tinder’s] abrupt policy change constitutes an unfair and deceptive trade practice, put into place to forcibly migrate users to paid subscription services, in order to receive the same services that had previously been provided and advertised free of charge,” the class action lawsuit alleges, calling it “a classic bait and switch.”

Warner is looking to represent a California class of Tinder users, who downloaded the app before March 2.

He is charging Tinder with violating the California False Advertising Act and unlawful, unfair, and fraudulent conduct according to California’s Unfair Competition Law.

The plaintiff is represented by Todd M. Friedman and Adrian R. Bacon of the Law Offices of Todd M Friedman, P.C.

There is no counsel information available at this time.

The Tinder False Advertising Class Action Lawsuit is Bill Warner v. Tinder, Inc., in the U.S. District Court for the Central District of California.