Assignee Liability for Consumer Claims
Speaker
Daniel Blinn, Consumer Law Group LLC
Program Description
Assignees of consumer credit contracts such as car loans originated by car dealerships are subject to consumer defenses under the Federal Trade Commission’s Holder Rule. The Holder Rule also provides that assignees are subject to claims against the original seller of goods and services, limited to the amounts paid by the consumer under the credit agreement.
A separate Connecticut statute, Conn. Gen. Stat. § 52-572g, likewise makes assignees subject to consumer defenses. That statute also provides that assignees are subject to consumer claims, limited to the amount paid by the consumer, provided that the consumer has first made a prior written demand upon the original seller of goods or services.
Although these two bases for assignee liability have co-existed for nearly 50 years, there was virtually no case law defining the scope of an assignee’s liability for consumer claims until the recent decision by the Connecticut Supreme Court in Hernandez v. Apple Auto Wholesalers of Waterbury, LLC, No. 20481, -- A.3d ---, 2021 WL 1846090 (Conn. 2021). Consumer Law Section Chair Daniel Blinn represented the consumer in that case, and he will be discussing the holding, the questions that it has answered, and the remaining questions unresolved by the decision.