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Amazon Video Purchase Class Action Lawsuit Overview:
- Who: Amanda Caudel filed a class action lawsuit against Amazon.
- Why: Caudel alleged that Amazon revokes access to videos purchased through its video streaming service and said she should have unlimited access.
- Where: The class action lawsuit was filed in a California federal court.
A California judge has dismissed a class action lawsuit against Amazon, saying the plaintiff lacks standing to sue, according to the dismissal.
In April 2020, Amanda Caudel filed a putative class action against Amazon.com, Inc. for violation of California consumer laws by allowing customers to purchase electronic media content at a higher fee than rented content when the purchased content might become unavailable to the consumer at a later date.
However, Caudel signed up for an Amazon account in 2016, has purchased 36 videos and each remains available to her. Her access has never been revoked, according to the court document.
“Here there is only one jurisdictional fact the court need consider, and that is the undisputed fact that Caudel has never lost access to any of the videos she purchased,” the dismissal states.
Class Action Alleged Amazon Could Revoke Access to Purchased Videos
In the lawsuit, Caudel said she purchased a video through Amazon because, due to the wording and advertisements used by Amazon, she believed she would have unlimited access to it. However, Caudel argued that Amazon could take away her access to purchased videos at any time.
The lawsuit noted that the online retailer offers customers the opportunity to either rent or buy a video through its streaming service. Allegedly, Amazon advertises that customers who rent a video will have access to the video for a limited amount of time and charges a lower price for this service. It then offers the additional option to buy a video for a higher price with the assumption that the customer will have unlimited access to the video.
According to Caudel, Amazon advertises this distinction and uses the promise of unlimited access to entice customers into purchasing, as opposed to just renting, a video for a higher price when, in reality, it reserves the right to terminate the customer’s access to and use of the video, the lawsuit states.
The plaintiff claimed that Amazon misleads customers about the reality of what it means to “purchase” a video through the site. Allegedly, the company is aware that customers will believe that purchasing a video gives them unlimited access to it because that is the usual understanding of the word “buy.”
Caudel and other customers were financially injured by Amazon’s practice of using misleading wording around video access, the lawsuit stated. She and other customers might not have purchased access to videos, or would not have paid as much for them, if they had known that their access to the videos could be revoked at any time.
She also said that Amazon was unjustly enriched by its sale of the videos and pricing around them because if Amazon had not engaged in the deceptive sales practices, the company would not have made as much money as it did from these sales.
Have you purchased video content from Amazon assuming that you would retain access? Share your story in the comment section below.
Caudel is represented by Michael R. Reese, Carlos F. Ramirez and George V. Granade of Reese LLP and by Spencer Sheehan of Sheehan & Associates PC.
The Amazon Video Purchase Class Action Lawsuit is Amanda Caudel v. Amazon.com Inc., Case No. 2:20-at-00409, in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of California.
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7 thoughts onJudge Dismisses Amazon Class Action Lawsuit Over Video Ownership
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I went to watch a Charlie Brown Thanksgiving today. This is a tradition in our family the day before Thanksgiving. But it is not in my purchases. Instead I can sign up for a new Apple TV account to stream it today. I had bought that and the Charlie Brown Christmas, but neither are in my purchases. I thought I bought it to have it forever. I bought it. I didn’t rent it. Now I have to repurchase or rent. This is not what I bought. I am not happy. I will never buy anything digital from Amazon again. Either I get a hard copy or nothing.
I was recently locked out of my account due to an denial from a cancelled credit card to pay for goods ordered in June. Nevermind we have spent $1000s since then on Amazon orders. Once they lock your account you loose everything. All books, movies, Prime membership which is pre-paid and utility of all devices since they don’t work unless registered. Effectively I have purchased $1000s of content and devices which are somewhat useless. Amazon support is utterly useless. Imagine buying a TV or computer from BestBuy and years later they lock it out because you failed to pay for a small $ item. It is absurd and seems criminal by any logical standard.
Yeah once ur no longer a prime member u lose access to all your videos my collection was extensive it included lord of ring hobbit star wars start trek and batman trilogies all 7 harry Potter movies plus 2 extra uncut copies of 1 and 2 several other random movies and then on top of Hollywood movies I had about tv series such as Rick and Morty season 1, 2 and 3 game of thrones season 1 and 2 gravity falls season 1 2 and 3 the list goes on. As others I thought I owned a digital copy of the videos. It’s not unreasonable to believe one would own the digital copy for life as other digital streaming companies like Vudu offer. Nor is it unreasonable to believe that you would have unrestricted access to them as the cost of the videos where the same as the cost of a physical copy one would buy from a store and own for life unrestricted by the store on when one could access it
This also happened to me. At first I thought I was losing my mind and it kept happening more and more often. Then they have the nerve to put the movie back and make me repurchase it. They should just have a “long term rental” button instead of a purchase button.
This happened to us as well, “bought” a movie and went to watch it again months later with our family and it was no where to be found in our purchased movie section, even though it was still available on Amazon for renting and purchasing. In my opinion the “Buy movie HD” option is incredibly misleading to the consumer, all normal interpretation of this wording from a consumer standpoint would be that you are permanently purchasing an online version of the movie to watch at your discretion. I can understand as others have said that should Amazon lose the license for the movie it would no longer be available but in our situation this was not the case.
I’ve purchased well over 50 movies on Amazon Prime. The whole concept is wrong to give you the option to “Buy” a movie when that is not the case. It’s very deceptive. The definition of Buy is not long term rental. Also it’s one thing if in the fine print it says that you could lose access to view the movie in your library if say another podcast or station picked up the movie and took the licensing credit away from Amazon; but if Amazon gets it back at a later date (which applies to a lot of my movies) then I should either not lose access to view them or get them back as soon as Amazon hosts them again