St. John's University Law Faculty Blog

LegalNewsline.com, a newswire covering state courts and attorneys general, quoted Professor Jeff Sovern in an article headlined Future of case against Best Buy could depend on if consumers are seen as gullible. The story, which reported on a suit against Best Buy for refusing to honor an offer to sell $200 gift cards for only $14, stated:

Jeff Sovern, a consumer rights expert and law professor at St. John’s University, spoke with Legal Newsline about this case. He said the verdict will likely be determined by what is expected of consumers.

“It sounds like the Best Buy offer was a typo. Courts have sometimes held advertisers liable for not living up to a price printed in error,” Sovern told Legal Newsline. “False advertising laws generally focus on whether a consumer would have been deceived by the ad.”

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“My own guess is that a reasonable consumer would recognize that was a typo,” Sovern said. “But other laws ask whether the ad would fool the credulous consumer. Maybe a credulous consumer would have been deceived.”

Posted on October 27, 2015 at 12:34 pm in In the Media   |  RSS feed |   Reply   |   Trackback URL