Rethinking a Right to Jury Trials Under Chapter 93A: Genesis of the Massachusetts Consumer Protection Act

Enacted in 1967, the Massachusetts Shopper Safety Act, G.L. c. 93A (Chapter 93A)—modeled after the Federal Commerce Fee Act (FTCA) of 1914—was designed to guard shoppers from unfair and deceptive enterprise practices. In that vein, Chapter 93A, like most different state shopper safety statutes, forbids “unfair or misleading acts or practices” within the conduct of any commerce or commerce affecting Massachusetts shoppers. See M.G.L.A. c. 93A § 2(a) (“Unfair strategies of competitors and unfair or misleading acts or practices within the conduct of any commerce or commerce are hereby declared illegal.”). Notably, in contrast to the FTCA, Chapter 93A supplies a non-public proper of motion for anybody injured by such unfair or misleading act or follow, and in sure conditions, additionally supplies for the restoration of lawyer charges and treble damages. Given these highly effective statutory treatments, and Chapter 93A’s broad statutory language, which invariably invitations inventive pleading and captures conduct that might in any other case match imprecisely inside common-law fraud, contract, or tort doctrines, Chapter 93A has change into probably the most broadly used statute in all of Massachusetts civil litigation.