Coupons Versus Millions

Coupons Versus Millions

Coupons Versus Millions

Personal injury lawyers have this habit of getting millions of dollars worth of damage awards from big companies and then handing clients discount coupons to use. In one state, there is a judge who aims to help these people out. Condemned by this judge was a New York City law firm that requested for $1.4 million in legal fees after offering cruise ship passengers travel vouchers for future trips with values ranging from $10 to $60.

The law firm settled a class action lawsuit against a cruise ship company for $2.9 million after the company had been accused of inflating port docking charges and passing them on to unwary passengers. The attorneys handed out a bill worth $1.4 million. Not only was the $1.4 million request decreased to slightly less than $300,000 but the judge also ordered to have it split among the firms, 5 of them in total, which had a part in the case, in a 27 page ruling.

He underlined his point by ordering that 25 per cent of the lawyers' legal fees be paid in the form of the same discount vouchers given to the 80,000 plaintiffs they managed to corral into the lawsuit. The firm's lead lawyer defended the travel vouchers as a real benefit to the passengers because many were repeat cruise customers. Considering how they can't use vouchers for bills, his colleagues said that they needed cash. The judge noted that personal injury lawyers often round up class action plaintiffs as parties to multimillion dollar lawsuits without their full knowledge, and then reward their clients with amounts so trivial as to be nearly meaningless. Applauding the judge were tort reform advocates since he used common sense in defending consumers against rapacious class action lawyers. The head of the James Madison Institute, a Tallahassee think tank, called the travel awards ridiculous, adding that essentially these vouchers have no value whatsoever. It is nonsense when it comes to getting $10 off of a cruise that is worth hundreds of dollars.

Some class action lawsuits remain positive. Compensation is deserved by those who are genuine victims of a corporation's ill actions. Used by the rich to become even wealthier, class action lawsuits have been designed to comfort the afflicted in the past. Waged by a group of multimillionaire personal injury lawyers led by a Mississippi attorney was a class action suit against HMOs in one state. While patient care remains unchanged, the personal injury lawyers conceded that this will cause health care costs to go through the roof. According to this Mississippi lawyer, he met with Wall Street financial analysts in October 1999 to get them to agree to downgrading HMO stocks and force a shareholder sell off. Here, everything makes sense.

Without breaking a sweat, the lawyers can earn millions because as stock prices plummet the HMOs will agree to our of court settlements. In one way or another, these lawsuits will harm the country as a Yale University law professor said. This can lead to the elimination of the managed care industry.

What will transpire is the rise of health care costs to all Americans. Considering how the lawsuit against the HMOs is only one in a long line of greed driven class actions, the congressional Republicans and Democrats should pass a meaningful tort reform act. For the average working Americans, they no longer wish to contribute to the retirement funds of lawyers who travel in their own private jets and go fishing on luxury yachts.

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