Amazon Class Action Filed Over Unwanted Prime Membership

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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.