Can Employers Opt Out Of Class Actions?

By a 5-4 vote, last month's U.S. Supreme Court decision in AT&T Mobility LLC v. Concepcion requires arbitration agreements to be enforced according to their terms, even if those terms prohibit class action arbitrations. Overruling California's Supreme Court -- which had held that class action waivers in consumer contracts were unconscionable -- the Supreme Court ruled that "[r]equiring the availability of classwide arbitration interferes with fundamental attributes of arbitration and thus creates a scheme inconsistent with the [Federal Arbitration Act]." Thus, while an arbitration agreement may specifically authorize arbitration on behalf of a class of individuals, if the agreement does not authorize class arbitration -- or specifically prohibits it -- the courts must enforce the agreement as written.