How much did customers overpay thanks to Halvarez?
Last week I reported about how the judge in the California lawsuit against SnapNames questioned how much money was at issue. In order to qualify for class action status, at least $5 million must be at stake.
In questioning the total number, the judge noted that the plaintiff in the case had lost a whopping $20. If ‘halvarez’ participated in 50,000 auctions at an average overpayment of $20, that would be only $1 million. It’s simple math, but the plaintiff decided two can use that logic.
Yesterday the plaintiff and his lawyers submitted their own crude analysis. The lawyers say they talked to a number of people, one of which had overpaid by $200 in an auction. So between one overpayment of $20 and another of $200, the median is $110. Multiply that by 50,000 and you get $5.5 million.
Hmm. Seems like a stretch to pick the highest overpayment selected out of talking to many people who were affected.
I’ve talked to lots of people, too. And I’d estimate the amount at play here is well under $5 million. Perhaps it makes sense for SnapNames to file with the court the exact amount at issue.
Louise says
If that’s the limit on the overpay, this is much ado about nothing! The media coverage gave the nebulous idea thousands were involved for individual customers, not just $200.00!
Halvarez needs to get himself some help; he needs to check himself in; that’s it!
Nic says
Why is no one still not taking it account the capital loss suffered by the immediate underbidders?
Nic says
Why is no one still not taking *into* account the capital loss suffered by the immediate underbidders?
stewart says
I read the remarks now and before in past articles about the $20.00 loss on my part, and today about the ‘simple math’ offense, and I am a bit cconfused as to why that sound so out of line here?
After all arent all you domainers bidding thousands of dollars for a name?
I mean just because my auction resulted in a relatively small loss is not marker to indicate that many never lost more over several years and thousands of auctions.
But you may have hit the mark, Oversee and Snapnames surely would have presented the court with the data to quash this class action if they could have addressed the courts question, and because you are such an astue observer and did not report that they did provide the court with the accounting in its raw totality to the contrary?
I think it safe to assume the threshold is exceeded.
Andrew Allemann says
@ Stewart – we may already have that answer. In its original communications, SnapNames wrote:
“The incremental revenue from the bidding represented approximately one percent of SnapNames’ auction revenue since 2005”
So to hit the $5M number, SnapNames would have had to gross a whopping $500 million since 2005. I highly doubt that.
stewart says
we shall see…
stewart says
But you know? One does have to ask, where is Nelson Brady aka halvarez after all and what have the authorities done about this tawdry matter?
Eddie says
Remember, that amount can be PER AUCTION. I’m not a giant domain guy, I’m somewhere in the middle. I’ve never paid more than $200-300 for a domain.
My settlement offer was almost $5k.
At that math, you hit $5mil very quick