New Cruise Line Telemarketing Class Action Settlement Gets Approved

A judge has granted approval to an amended cruise line TCPA class action settlement for a second time after changes were made to the distribution plan.

Objectors, Class Members, and three cruise lines had filed a joint motion to amend a previous TCPA class action settlement that ended claims that the cruise lines sent unwanted robocalls.

Now that motion has received approval from a judge, Class Members will receive additional benefits from the settlement.

Under the terms of the amended cruise line class action settlement, the settlement administrator will send out a second-round of checks to Class Members if funds remain after the first-round of settlement checks are sent.

The court documents explain that these second-round checks effectively allow Class Members to receive more benefits. In the initial TCPA class action settlement, a second distribution would be mailed if funds allowed for each Class Member to get a $5 additional check. Now, thanks to the amendments, Class Members will receive a second check if settlement funds remain so that each Class Member would receive at least a $2.50 check.

With the amendments, payouts from the settlement will rise, with the lowest payment at around $8 and the highest payment at $598. Exact payments will vary depending on the number of claims filed along with other factors.

Additionally, the cruise lines and class counsel have agreed to both contribute $50,000 in attorneys’ fees for objectors in the amended TCPA class action settlement. The settlement deal dictates that no part of the $50,000 awards would come from the settlement funds.

Judge Wood granted approval to the amended settlement, saying that to reach a settlement with objectors would provide benefits to Class Members faster than taking the claims to the Court of Appeals. According to the judge, if the appeal had gone to court, Class Members would likely have had to wait six months or a year after the appeal was resolved to receive their benefits.

Although Judge Wood approved the changes, the judge stressed that the amendments “do not impact [the court’s] prior reasoning approving the settlement as fair.” The judge notes that, because the amendment does not affect the previous determination that the initial settlement was fair, there is no need to send further notice to Class Members or hold another fairness hearing. 

On Oct. 28, 2019, Judge Wood had approved a $12.5 million TCPA class action settlement that provided an average payment of $22 for a Class of around 275,000 customers who allegedly received spam calls from the three cruise lines.

A number of Class Members objected to the previous settlement approved by Judge Wood, urging the court to lower the threshold for additional payments. Judge Wood had dismissed their objections, so the objectors had planned to take their objections to the Court of Appeals.

However, now that the changes have been approved, the objectors instead have agreed to drop their objections in their deal with the other Class Members and the three cruise lines — Carnival Corporation & PLC, Royal Caribbean Cruises LTD, and NCL (Bahamas LTD). 

Did you receive an unsolicited phone call from a cruise company? Let us know in the comment section below.

Class Members are represented by Matthew McCue of the Law Office of Matthew P. McCue, Alexander Burke of Burke Law Offices and Edward Broderick and Anthony Paronich of Broderick & Paronich PC. The objectors are represented by Jonathan Lawrence Hilton of Hilton Parker LLC and W. Allen McDonald of Lacy Price & Wagner PC.

The Royal Caribbean TCPA Class Action Lawsuit is Charvat v. Valente, et al., Case No. 1:12-cv-05746, in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Illinois.

UPDATE: On Aug. 13, 2020, Top Class Actions viewers started receiving long-awaited checks in the mail from the Carnival Cruise, Royal Caribbean telemarketing class action settlement worth as much as $25.02! Congratulations to everyone who filed a valid claim and got PAID!

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