According to a proposed class action against Peloton, one consumer believes the company has been “pedal”-ing its apparel goods too hard.
Alicia Armas filed a proposed class-action lawsuit against the fitness and activewear company, alleging that it violated the Telephone Consumer Protection Act of 1991 (TPCA) by sending repeated, unwanted text messages after she opted out.
Armas said despite her choice to opt out of Peloton’s marketing text messages in March by responding “stop” to one such message, the company “continued to text message [her] and the class members to harass them into making purchases from [Peloton].”
The complaint includes two screenshots of texts allegedly sent by Peloton in June, advertising its apparel products, but Armas contends that those messages are just two of “approximately 12 marketing text messages after [the] initial stop request.”
That, her legal team stated in the complaint, means that Peloton has not done its due diligence on respecting consumers’ decisions to end communications about sales and products the company wants to sell.
“[Peloton’s] refusal to honor [Armas’] opt-out requests demonstrates that [the company] has not instituted procedures for maintaining a list of persons who request not to receive text messages from [it],” Armas’ attorneys contend in the complaint, further alleging that the company gives improper training to marketing employees required to send solicitation texts and that it lacks the proper mechanisms to maintain a do-not-call registry of its own.
Armas’ complaint proposes a class she defines as follows: “All persons within the United States who, within the four years prior to the filing of this lawsuit through the date of class certification, received two or more text messages within any 12-month period, from or on behalf of [Peloton], regarding [the company’s] goods, services or properties, to said person’s residential cellular telephone number, after communicating to Defendant that they did not wish to receive text messages by replying to the messages with a ‘stop’ or similar opt-out instruction.”
The complaint alleges that there are “at least 50 individuals that fall within the class definition given Defendant’s use of automated robotexts to solicit consumers and refusal to honor stop requests.”
In her prayer for relief, which alleges that Peloton violated multiple portions of the TPCA, Armas asks the court to certify the proposed class, which would allow the legal action to proceed; declare that Peloton has violated the TPCA and issue applicable monetary damages to impacted consumers.
Armas filed the complaint on June 27 in the Southern District of Florida; as of Friday afternoon, court records show that Peloton had not responded to Armas’ complaint, nor had a judge certified the class as requested.
Peloton did not immediately return Sourcing Journal’s request for comment on the allegations set forth in Armas’ complaint.
