Couple Sued For $1M For Negative Yelp Review

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Remember the couple that were sued over a negative Yelp review back in February (link)? Well, that lawsuit was dropped but, just as we predicted back then, the company is now suing for up to $1 million because of all the negative press it received over the initial lawsuit.

A couple months back, we told you of the Texas couple that was being sued for a few thousand dollars by a petsitter over a negative Yelp review that allegedly violated a “non-disparagement” clause in the petsitter’s contract. That suit was quickly dropped, but a new complaint filed by the petsitting business has ramped up the allegations and the dollar amount, now seeking between $200,000 to $1 million in damages.

 
Yeah, this will only help that companies public image. Idiots.

Pretty sure this won't fly, either.
 
This is a terrible trend. People have the right to express their displeasure with a business. I see Yelp going down the tubes as things like this happen.
 
I know you can sue for anything but are they really suing because of the backlash from their own actions as a result of someone elses review? How many hops down the shut-the-f***-up chain can they move before it isn't even allowed?
 
This is the sort of thing that would just be thrown out immediately nearly everywhere. But no, not a Texas court.
 
Well they did sign the contract, they could have "crossed out" the non-disparagement clause. k æ v ɛ ɑː t ˈ ɛ m p t ɔːr "let the buyer beware"
Although, even if the company wins the case, the bad PR could put them out of business. Not exactly a consumer friendly business practice imo.
 
The Streisand Effect just evolved into 2.0: an actual suit.. next stop - 3.0: sue the internet!

While we're at it, where has Jack Thompson been hiding?
 
modi123 said:
The Streisand Effect just evolved into 2.0: an actual suit.. next stop - 3.0: sue the internet!
Click to expand...

Well, technically, you might give that "first" to SCO who claimed at one point that anyone using Linux could be sued by them and owed them royalties.

SCO/Linux controversies - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

On March 30, 2010, following a jury trial, Novell, and not The SCO Group, was unanimously found to be the owner of the UNIX and UnixWare copyrights.The SCO Group, through bankruptcy trustee Edward Cahn, has decided to continue the lawsuit against IBM for causing a decline in SCO revenues
Click to expand...

^SCO started the whole lawsuit thing, and then complained about the results of the lawsuit on their business.
 
cptnjarhead said:
Although, even if the company wins the case, the bad PR could put them out of business. Not exactly a consumer friendly business practice imo.
Click to expand...

The likely reason for this 2nd lawsuit is because they destroyed their business with all the negative PR from the first lawsuit.
Instead of learning from their mistake, they are doubling down. :banghead:
 
cptnjarhead said:
Well they did sign the contract, they could have "crossed out" the non-disparagement clause. k æ v ɛ ɑː t ˈ ɛ m p t ɔːr "let the buyer beware"
Although, even if the company wins the case, the bad PR could put them out of business. Not exactly a consumer friendly business practice imo.
Click to expand...
I'm curious if the companies let you do this? Can't they just say no, we aren't allowing you to changes the terms of the contract? Has anyone here tried this?
 
BreezeDM said:
I'm curious if the companies let you do this? Can't they just say no, we aren't allowing you to changes the terms of the contract? Has anyone here tried this?
Click to expand...

Yeah, they can refuse to do business with you in which case you've probably dodged a bullet.
 
cptnjarhead said:
Although, even if the company wins the case, the bad PR could put them out of business. Not exactly a consumer friendly business practice imo.
Click to expand...

I would stay far, far away from that business. No sense in taking on that legal risk while being a customer. I'll go elsewhere.

Bad reviews happen. I see them all over Yelp and other review sites. The best ones are where there is a response - "Please contact us at [email protected] so we can find out how we can correct this and make it better." and there is an update to the review. Some places have bad days, some people have some SERIOUSLY high expectations (most people have seen these people out and about - the REAL entitlement folks). There will be bad reviews. How the company approaches these reviews is a big deal. Suing them is an immediate turn off. Use the review to make your company better. Sometimes, you cannot please the person. Oh well, let it go. Customers reading the reviews know that there are those "Do you know who I am!? I want to speak to your manager!" people out there. As long as it's not all bad reviews, we get it.
 
Typically you get better responses editing contracts with smaller businesses. My current landlord and I went back and forth a couple of times on the lease.

And yeah, I would never sign anything with a non-disparagement clause. Heck, other than EULA's I've never agreed to anything with an arbitration clause. Though I have had some banks come back later with updated terms adding them in.

Fuckers.
 
The petsitter (Prestigious Pets in Dallas for those who want to know) is playing with fire on this one. Texas passed a Tort Reform law that makes it a lot easier for a defendant to get legal fees (and even damages) from the plaintiff if the plaintiff's lawsuit is deemed frivolous:
Texas Law said:
Subtitle B, Title 2, Civil Practice and Remedies Code
Sec. 27.009. DAMAGES AND COSTS.
(a) If the court orders dismissal of a legal action under this chapter, the court shall award to the moving party:
(1) court costs, reasonable attorney's fees, and other
expenses incurred in defending against the legal action as justice
and equity may require; and
(2) sanctions against the party who brought the legal
action as the court determines sufficient to deter the party who
brought the legal action from bringing similar actions described in
this chapter.
Click to expand...
 
Time to unleash the reddit mob on this..at least that cesspool is useful for something.
 
These people sound like a couple of douches. I am fine with them being sued for $200,000 - $1,000,000

They didn't get enough updates about what their pets were doing? WTF
 
non-disparagement clauses are illegal in the context they are being used in

They are normally used in lawsuits where ppl settle in or out of court so no more defamatory comments can be made by either party, or where a company pays an employee and the employee can't say anything negative about the business etc

Its not meant to protect companies from dolling out shitty products or ppl being paid to do a service and are absolutely crap at it, because this falls under freedom of speech where a person is allowed to express/review about a company/product/service as much as they want
 
Exavior said:
These people sound like a couple of douches. I am fine with them being sued for $200,000 - $1,000,000

They didn't get enough updates about what their pets were doing? WTF
Click to expand...
? Read the original article, it wasn't only the lack of updates. They were mad because the fish tank was left dirty and cloudy, company screwed up on the bill and they didn't leave their spare key behind
 
Darunion said:
I know you can sue for anything but are they really suing because of the backlash from their own actions as a result of someone elses review? How many hops down the shut-the-f***-up chain can they move before it isn't even allowed?
Click to expand...

I think it's the counter-suit that should do the trick :cool:
 
Ragenrok said:
? Read the original article, it wasn't only the lack of updates. They were mad because the fish tank was left dirty and cloudy, company screwed up on the bill and they didn't leave their spare key behind
Click to expand...

This article states "The couple also claim that their fish might have received sub-optimal care in their absence". No, I didn't read the one from months ago till now. Even that article doesn't change my opinion of them. Hell even the Yelp review doesn't change it much. They were complaining about being told it is $5 to walk a dog per day and were changed $10 per day. Well... they have two dogs so that makes sense. If candy bars are $1 and I get two of them I expect to pay $2. I can also understand a company wanting to have all calls / messages go through them. I wouldn't want my personal cell number given out to every single person I do work for like that. Plus what if that sitter is out for the day for some reason and somebody else has to fill in. If you call your ISP you call a call center and they dispatch a tech. if you need to get ahold of them you call the call center back. they don't give you the direct cell phone number of the tech so that you can interface directly with him. Also in a case like this, I could also see the company not wanting their employees to give out their cell numbers. As then next time the person could call that sitter directly and offer them the work directly, giving that company no cut of the money then. So I can fully understand that and don't see an issue there. Also like the company stated in their reply on Yelp, by you calling the office you know a person will respond vs a sitter missing your call because they are busy taking care of animals.

The tank being cloudy if true I am iffy on. Was it cloudy because these people were letting it get cloudy before they left on their 4 night trip or did the person actually do something to make it cloudy. Also what is their meaning of cloudy. Given everything else here I could see cloudy meaning they saw some minor and blew it up to be major.

I can understand the spare key also. Since the company has the key anything that happens at that point is their responsibility. So if somebody sees them leave it outside and then enters the house they are the ones responsible for having given the person that key. So they have policies in place for how they will return the keys. And it sounds like leaving it outside on your porch isn't one of them.

So out of all their bitching, I will give them maybe 1/2 a point to their side. The rest sounds like some up tight whiny people.

Not that I normally would agree with suing people for posting any type of review, these people just rub me the wrong way so I don't really care in this case.
 
Too bad more states don't have anti-SLAPP laws. Frivolous cases like this could be thrown out during the initial hearing if it were available.
 
Exavior said:
This article states "The couple also claim that their fish might have received sub-optimal care in their absence". No, I didn't read the one from months ago till now. Even that article doesn't change my opinion of them. Hell even the Yelp review doesn't change it much. They were complaining about being told it is $5 to walk a dog per day and were changed $10 per day. Well... they have two dogs so that makes sense. If candy bars are $1 and I get two of them I expect to pay $2. I can also understand a company wanting to have all calls / messages go through them. I wouldn't want my personal cell number given out to every single person I do work for like that. Plus what if that sitter is out for the day for some reason and somebody else has to fill in. If you call your ISP you call a call center and they dispatch a tech. if you need to get ahold of them you call the call center back. they don't give you the direct cell phone number of the tech so that you can interface directly with him. Also in a case like this, I could also see the company not wanting their employees to give out their cell numbers. As then next time the person could call that sitter directly and offer them the work directly, giving that company no cut of the money then. So I can fully understand that and don't see an issue there. Also like the company stated in their reply on Yelp, by you calling the office you know a person will respond vs a sitter missing your call because they are busy taking care of animals.

The tank being cloudy if true I am iffy on. Was it cloudy because these people were letting it get cloudy before they left on their 4 night trip or did the person actually do something to make it cloudy. Also what is their meaning of cloudy. Given everything else here I could see cloudy meaning they saw some minor and blew it up to be major.

I can understand the spare key also. Since the company has the key anything that happens at that point is their responsibility. So if somebody sees them leave it outside and then enters the house they are the ones responsible for having given the person that key. So they have policies in place for how they will return the keys. And it sounds like leaving it outside on your porch isn't one of them.

So out of all their bitching, I will give them maybe 1/2 a point to their side. The rest sounds like some up tight whiny people.

Not that I normally would agree with suing people for posting any type of review, these people just rub me the wrong way so I don't really care in this case.
Click to expand...
I agreed with some of your points but not all. I agree about the phone number and that's why I didn't mention it because your right they don't have a right/need to the person's number but asking for a daily status is not unreasonable, why can't they keep a log stating what time the pets were fed and walked everyday as well as general look of each pet. It would take 5 minutes a day to make and send to the company who could then forward to the owners. It may only be $5 a day more but that's twice what was quoted which is a lot in that respect.

As for the key, make them sign a release at the beggining releaving the company of liability if it does get stolen. I think that you have a right to complain about this stuff, barring anything else being charged twice the quoted price for a service is a valid reason all on its own.
 
Ragenrok said:
I agreed with some of your points but not all. I agree about the phone number and that's why I didn't mention it because your right they don't have a right/need to the person's number but asking for a daily status is not unreasonable, why can't they keep a log stating what time the pets were fed and walked everyday as well as general look of each pet. It would take 5 minutes a day to make and send to the company who could then forward to the owners. It may only be $5 a day more but that's twice what was quoted which is a lot in that respect.

As for the key, make them sign a release at the beggining releaving the company of liability if it does get stolen. I think that you have a right to complain about this stuff, barring anything else being charged twice the quoted price for a service is a valid reason all on its own.
Click to expand...

Which they do keep track of that stuff according to the statement made by the company. They give customers ways to look at that stuff whenever they want. According to the reply of the company they have methods for the customers to know exactly what is going on while away. However these people did not seem to know about these methods and were trying to use the most pain in the ass method of making somebody email them or whatever every day with an update when they could have just used online methods to keep up to date with what was going on.

We have no way to know did they say $5 a day or $5 per dog per day in the quote. Because those two words makes a huge difference when you taken into consideration they have two pets. Its a $20 difference in this case during their 4 day trip. Looking at their site I see where you can pay them $20 to walk one dog for 20 - 30 minutes, each additional dog is $5. Pet sitting is $20 for 1 - 3 pets per visit. As stated in their review, they paid for pet watching and were informed that did not include pet walking and that was an additional fee. Thus I could see where the $5 would be per dog if that is the rate they would charge you for walking a dog if you are already paying for another dog to be walked. So I can understand how being told it is an extra $5 to walk a dog somebody could completely ignore the fact that you might have to pay per dog instead of $5 gives you unlimited dogs. As would it make sense that somebody pay $5 for having 200 dogs walked?

As for the key, if we believe the company (which we have as much right to do as the customer) they clearly stated up front what their policy was and gave the home owners multiple ways to get their keys. Just turned out that leaving it wasn't one of them I guess. The people then selected the only option after the fact that cost money which is to have the key mailed to them (which is a horrible method but a different issue).

Remember there are always two sides to a story.
 
Exavior said:
The tank being cloudy if true I am iffy on. Was it cloudy because these people were letting it get cloudy before they left on their 4 night trip or did the person actually do something to make it cloudy. Also what is their meaning of cloudy. Given everything else here I could see cloudy meaning they saw some minor and blew it up to be major.
Click to expand...

Blew it up to be major? They left a negative Yelp review. That's major?

Saying their claims are unreasonable or their complaints are frivolous is fine, saying they owe a million dollars for voicing those complaints is pure lunacy.
 
Spewn said:
Blew it up to be major? They left a negative Yelp review. That's major?

Saying their claims are unreasonable or their complaints are frivolous is fine, saying they owe a million dollars for voicing those complaints is pure lunacy.
Click to expand...

I meant considering something minor to be worse than it really is in regards to calling the tank cloudy. For example, When I was in my early teens (13 - 14) I would work for my uncle's lawn care service every now and then if he was really short handed and needed help. One day I had to mow the yard of some doctor living in a nice house. He made sure to tell me before I started that he wanted his yard mowed at a 45 degree angle. Once I got done it looked closer to maybe about 42 degrees and my lines where not 100% straight although pretty close. He was not happy and yelled at my uncle for allowing somebody to destroy his yard like that. My uncle ended up not charging the guy that day and as a result I just worked a day for nothing. Now in your opinion did I destroy a yard by mowing at a 42 degree angle instead of a 45 degree angle? Or the people that a kid can have one toy on the floor and they call that the room being a mess and throw a fit yelling at the child. That is what I meant by blowing something up to be major, making something appear to be much worse than it is in reality. In this case it could have been that the water was just a little dirty and they wanted it kept crystal clear so that is made to be that the tank was dirty and their fish was close to being killed by the people.

As I said in theory I don't agree with these type of cases. I don't think that you should be able to sign away your rights to voice your opinion or seek action against somebody. Just like the clauses that say that by using these service or by doing something you wave all rights to file a suit against a company. I don't think those should be allowed. In this case, it is kind of like a major company getting hit with some stupid fine and having to pay millions. Lets say some oil company suddenly had to pay $200 million due to not using the most efficient routes to deliver oil or something like that. Normally you would think that is a stupid thing to be fined over, but if it was the oil companies you would think fuck them they make billions. I just don't care personally about these people, because more of I think they were bitching about stupid things to start with. Sure they should be able to bitch about it, but I still think there is a possibility that they were complaining about things that were just their misunderstanding or were being made into issues by them. That said, I do think companies should have the right to stand up to people that are lying about them online, trying to hurt their reputation on purpose, or are outright posting slander against them. So there are some times that a suit is valid when the review is made with the actual intent to do harm vs tell about a negative outcome you had.
 
After all that hemming and hawing, are you still "fine with them being sued for $200,000 - $1,000,000"?


NOTICE OF LEGAL CONTRACT: By responding to this post, all respondents agree to take no action which is intended, or would reasonably be expected, to harm the poster or its or their reputation or which would reasonably be expected to lead to unwanted or unfavorable publicity to the poster.
 
evilsofa said:
After all that hemming and hawing, are you still "fine with them being sued for $200,000 - $1,000,000"?


NOTICE OF LEGAL CONTRACT: By responding to this post, all respondents agree to take no action which is intended, or would reasonably be expected, to harm the poster or its or their reputation or which would reasonably be expected to lead to unwanted or unfavorable publicity to the poster.
Click to expand...

Do I care if these people in particular get sued for any amount of money? No I don't. People can be sued for anything, if the jury agrees it is a bull shit case then they don't end up paying. The vibe I get from reading the two articles and the yelp review make me uncaring about anything that happens personally to them in this case regardless of the fact that I don't think companies should be able to sue for honest negative reviews.
 
how this should have went down

couple leaves negative review

company replies back with a detailed explanation of what they did and how they took care of the customer

but nope, company ruins their reputation.
 
Jim Kim said:
Don't you dare beetlejuice that scumbag.
Click to expand...
Why would it even matter, the gu has been disbarred, so there is even less he can do nowadays.

That said, he also seemed reasonable when I last saw him in an interview... it's like he's a politician, when they're on and off a campaign trail.

Back on topic... company is retarded.
 
Exavior said:
I meant considering something minor to be worse than it really is in regards to calling the tank cloudy. For example, When I was in my early teens (13 - 14) I would work for my uncle's lawn care service every now and then if he was really short handed and needed help. One day I had to mow the yard of some doctor living in a nice house. He made sure to tell me before I started that he wanted his yard mowed at a 45 degree angle. Once I got done it looked closer to maybe about 42 degrees and my lines where not 100% straight although pretty close. He was not happy and yelled at my uncle for allowing somebody to destroy his yard like that. My uncle ended up not charging the guy that day and as a result I just worked a day for nothing. Now in your opinion did I destroy a yard by mowing at a 42 degree angle instead of a 45 degree angle? Or the people that a kid can have one toy on the floor and they call that the room being a mess and throw a fit yelling at the child. That is what I meant by blowing something up to be major, making something appear to be much worse than it is in reality. In this case it could have been that the water was just a little dirty and they wanted it kept crystal clear so that is made to be that the tank was dirty and their fish was close to being killed by the people.
Click to expand...

In your opinion did you deserve a million dollars for that overreaction? That's what this is about. You can consider their complaints unreasonable if you wish, but that's a far cry from saying they owe a million dollars for leaving an unreasonably-bad review.
 
WTF ?????

I see people leaving bad product reviews on the 'egg and amazon all the time after they bought something doesn't work as expected or they just didn't like it, and I can't recall hearing about a single one of them getting sued by the mfgr's of those products......

They post some pretty negative terms like "What a POS", "don't waste your money on this" or "this item doesn't work any better than xxx's product that costs 3 times less"

What am I missing here ?
 
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