On October 2, the First Circuit heard oral argument in this case, which raises an important issue of online contract formation that arises from a large and growing category of online standardized consumer agreements. At issue is whether a business has provided the online customer with sufficient notice of its mandatory arbitration policy and class action waiver, and whether the customer has consented to those terms, when the arbitration provisions are viewable only by clicking on a hyperlink to the agreement’s terms and conditions, and the customer is not required to check an online box indicating that she has accepted those terms. Instead, the business has clearly provided that the customer will be deemed to have accepted all of the contract terms once she has created an online account.
The defendant business in this case is Uber Technologies, Inc., the online ride-sharing service. When a customer creates an online account with Uber, Uber clearly states that “[b]y creating an Uber account, you agree to the Terms of Service & Privacy Policy.” (Emphasis in original.) The words “Terms of Service” appear as a highlighted button with a hyperlink that, if clicked, opens a ten-page agreement containing a mandatory arbitration clause and a class action waiver, under the bold-faced heading, “Dispute Resolution.”
The plaintiff and putative lead class representative, Rachel Cullinane, argues, so far without success, that she had inadequate notice of Uber’s arbitration provisions because they were viewable only in a separate document, and because Uber did not require her to state affirmatively that she had accepted those terms. In essence, she argues that Uber structured the online sign-up process to discourage her from finding out about Uber’s arbitration policy. Consequently, Cullinane filed a putative class action in court, rather than submit her underlying claim to individual arbitration. (In her underlying claim, she alleges that Uber imposed fictitious fees that were hidden in charges for legitimate local tolls to and from Logan Airport, in violation of Mass. G. L. c. 93A.)
NELF filed an amicus brief in support of Uber, arguing that, under well-established principles of Massachusetts contract law, a customer has indeed consented to a business’s arbitration policy once the customer has indicated her consent to all of the terms contained in the agreement, in the manner of acceptance defined by the business. It is well settled in Massachusetts that a party who enters into a contract is bound by all of its terms, whether she has read them or not. That is, the contracting party is presumed to know all of the agreement’s terms and has a duty to read them. This duty applies equally to contract terms that are incorporated by reference in that agreement, such as Uber’s arbitration provisions that are viewable through a hyperlink in this case. It is also well settled in Massachusetts that the offeror, here Uber, controls the manner of acceptance. Accordingly, Cullinane accepted Uber’s arbitration policy once she completed the online registration process, because Uber clearly stated that completion of that process would indicate her acceptance of Uber’s contract terms.
In short, NELF argues that Massachusetts law treats contract formation as an objective process, in which the contracting party’s actual state of mind is irrelevant once that party has manifested her consent to the terms of an agreement, in the manner of acceptance prescribed by the offeror. NELF points out that a decision in Cullinane’s favor would contravene these bedrock principles of contract formation. Such a decision would allow a consumer to evade her contractual responsibility to read and understand the agreement’s terms before she accepts them. She would then be free to attempt to undo the countless transactions that occur over the internet every day, by pleading ignorance of contract terms that she does not like. This, in turn, would disrupt and undermine free enterprise on the internet, to the financial detriment of the business community.