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Amazon was hit with a class action lawsuit alleging the online retail giant falsely advertises its “prime” membership to consumers.
A group of Amazon customers from California and Texas allege in their class action lawsuit that they were duped into paying for a prime membership when they purchased products online from Amazon.
According to the Amazon website, “Prime members … enjoy exclusive access to movies and TV shows, ad-free music, Kindle books, original audio series and unlimited photo storage,” in addition to free shipping.
The plaintiffs allege that they purchased products from Amazon under the belief that they would not be charged for a “prime” membership; however, they say that unbeknownst to them they were actually charged for the membership for multiple years. The plaintiffs further claim that Amazon refused to provide a refund when they discovered their accounts were being charged for the prime membership without their consent or knowledge.
“[Amazon] represents to its consumers that they could use its services to purchase products directly from its website at no cost to the consumer in addition to the cost of the product,” the Amazon class action lawsuit states. “However, despite these representations, Defendant charged Plaintiffs and similarly situated consumers additional fees. Specifically, when consumers purchased products from Defendant, they were also charged an additional ‘Amazon Prime’ membership fee”
According to the class action complaint, the plaintiffs and proposed Class Members were never presented with written terms prior to their purchase of Amazon’s prime membership. Additionally, they say that Amazon represented to them and others that they would not be charged for a membership.
The plaintiffs seek to represent a nationwide Class of consumers who used Amazon and were charged for a prime membership along with Texas and California subclasses. The plaintiffs also seek to represent a subclass of individuals who had bank accounts that were charged the prime membership fee by Amazon using electronic fund transfers.
“[A]ll claims in this matter arise from the identical, false, affirmative written statements that consumers would not need to pay additional fees to purchase products from Defendant’s website,” alleges the class action complaint.
The plaintiffs allege that Amazon extracted between $100 and $400 electronically from their bank accounts for prime memberships they didn’t want.
“[Amazon] knew that their representations and omissions were untrue and misleading, and deliberately made the aforementioned representations and omissions in order to deceive reasonable consumers,” alleges the Amazon class action complaint.
According to the lawsuit, Amazon’s marketing and charging of the prime membership fees violates California and Texas consumer protection laws, as well as the federal Electronic Funds Transfer Act. The plaintiffs are seeking damages for these claims as well as an order requiring Amazon to notify its customers of its alleged false marketing scheme.
The Amazon consumers are represented by Todd M. Friedman, Adrian R. Bacon, Meghan E. George, and Thomas E. Wheeler of the Law Offices of Todd M. Friedman PC.
The Amazon Prime Membership False Advertising Class Action Lawsuit is Laura Makenna, et al. v. Amazon.com LLC, Case No. 3:17-cv-04412, in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California.
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545 thoughts onAmazon Class Action Filed Over Unwanted Prime Membership
I was also charged. It took me 4 clicks to cancel my Prime membership, but guess what — those four clicks didn’t cancel it.
To add insult to injury, they also charged me for shipping.
I would be very interested in joining this class action. Amazon has fraudulently charged me for “Subscriptions” for music, Prime, and ShowTime I never authorized. They repeatedly said they would refund……never….I took screenshots showing zero Subscriptions…
I changed the numbers on my credit card and disputed it and AMAZON STILL LIED. This truly is unreal and consumer fraud.
I’m outraged, I have been billed for the last year for Amazon prime, Amazon ebooks, and merchandise that I didn’t order or receive, when I called they told me they couldn’t give me the information of who was using my credit card cause they had the right to be protected, but I guess I don’t have the right, im out 1500 dollars plus all the interest as well for a year. I’m very interested in joining this action. I also have a email where they say it wasn’t me and they had charged both of us,
If you find out how to join the class action lawsuit please let me know I’ve been dealing with this for a year now
How do I find out a out being included in the class action law suit?
Please let me know if you find an answer
Amazon started charging me for a Prime Membership without my authorization in Feb 2020. They claim the date this digital order was entered was Jan 9, 2020. Sold by Amazon.com LLC to me as the recipient. On April 20, 2020 my sister purchased a Prime Membership for me as a gift knowing I was not a member. They never honored this. I only found out today that they have been charging my credit card $12.99 a month since Feb, 2020 because I received a cancellation for my membership which I thought was the membership my sister paid for til April 2021. I spoke with 5 different people at Amazon before they disclosed this information. I have cancelled the fraudulent membership and insisted I am given a credit for the $119 my sister paid for the real Prime membership that Amazon claims “was never activated”. I have removed my credit card info from their records but I do not trust them going forward. It is impossible to speak to anyone in Customer Service who knows anything but I think this is by design. Can I join your class action suit or do I need to reside in California or Texas?
I cancelled my amazon prime in may of 2018 for double charging me on prime membership. The didn’t refund me at all and I was forced to pay delinquent services charges to my bank. I just realized 1/29/19 they have been charging me for prime membership and never stopped.. How can I stop getting charged and get a law suit going?
They charged me too much. Not Right
In 2019 I attempted to cancel a Prime membership on my account and had it reinstated the very same day, when I called to have it canceled again it was once more reinstated the very same day. Only the third time I called to have it canceled did it stay unsubscribed. Now I have just discovered today that a Prime Membership began October 3rd when I have not logged into my account since October 1st.
This happened to me about 7 times last year within the span of of 2 months. I called and even asked them to block me from their services which they wouldn’t do. They would simply try to turn it back on me saying I didn’t cancel auto pay, or someone must’ve had access to an Amazon product which was logged in with my credentials.
I recently tried to cancel an Amazon Prime subscription that I did not subscribe to. I contacted Amazon and the representative told me that I did not have Amazon Prime. I asked her why I had been being charged every month for the last 6 months and she had no answers. I have 2 accounts and she couldn’t find anything on either. I had to contact my credit card company to have the payments stopped. The rep from Capital One said this was not the first time she’d heard this.