Class Action Incentive Awards Banned by SCOTUS, 11th Cir. Says

Medical debt collector NPAS Solutions LLC’s $1.4 million Telephone Consumer Protection Act class settlement came partially undone Thursday, after the Eleventh Circuit concluded that the class representative’s award—indeed all class representative awards—are banned by long-standing Supreme Court precedent.

“Familiarity breeds inattention, and it falls to us to correct the errors in the case before us,” Judge Kevin C. Newsom wrote for the majority of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit.

The court said class representative Charles T. Johnson’s $6,000 incentive payment was at odds with U.S. Supreme Court precedent directly on point but “largely overlooked in modern ...