Class Action Seeks to Halt Unsolicited Northwell Health Fax Ads
Boca Raton, Florida-based Kawa Orthodontics filed a Telephone Consumer Protection Act suit Thursday to challenge the practice of four Northwell Health subsidiaries of sending unsolicited fax advertisements promoting their lab services to unhappy recipients, said Kawa’s class action (docket 9:23-cv-81424)…
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in U.S. District Court for Southern Florida in West Palm Beach. Kawa alleges receiving a single Northwell fax ad Sept. 18 but asserts the fax it received “is a generic advertising template suitable for mass transmission to numerous recipients.” On that basis, Kawa alleges that the defendants, or persons or entities acting on their behalf, violated the TCPA by sending the same fax ad to members of the proposed class, it said. Because the TCPA’s Section 227(b)(3) creates a private right of action for those to whom unsolicited fax advertisements are sent, “the statutory rights conferred by the TCPA are violated upon the sending of the unsolicited fax advertisement regardless of whether the fax is ultimately reviewed by an actual person,” it said. The unsolicited fax ads violate Kawa’s and class members’ “right to privacy and interest in seclusion,” plus they’re a nuisance and they “interfere with interstate commerce,” alleged the class action. The unsolicited fax ads also cause harm in that they “occupy fax lines, prevent fax machines from receiving authorized faxes and prevent their use for authorized outgoing faxes,” it said. They also cause “undue wear and tear on the recipients’ fax machines,” and require “additional labor and effort to attempt to discern the source and purpose of the unsolicited message,” it said. The action seeks relief “expressly authorized by the TCPA,” including an award of statutory damages of at least $500 for each TCPA violation, “and to have such damages trebled,” under the TCPA’s Section 227(b)(3), “in the event willfulness in violating the TCPA is shown.”