Santa Clara, CA: OKCupid parent's company, MATCH.com, is facing a consumer fraud class action lawsuit brought by a customer who alleges he was duped into paying for a premium “A-List” account with OKCupid at a cost of $45, when in fact there was no benefit to the upgrade, and that OKCupid was aware of that fact.
Specifically, plaintiff Chad Perkins of North Aurora, Illinois, claims that the dating site, OKCupid, entices its users to enroll in the “A-List” account program so the users can see who has “liked” them. Perkins alleges that he did just that only to discover that most of the profiles he had paid an upgrade to view, turned out to be inactive “and thus, are not viable dating options.”
OKCupid allegedly keeps a running tally of other users who have “liked” your profile, but doesn’t allow you to view those users unless you upgrade to its “A-List” service. The complaint contains screenshots of Perkins' profile, showing that roughly 40 other users liked him and encouraging him to try the A-List service to connect with them. According to the suit, after paying for access, Perkins found that “most if not all of these people were associated with inactive or ‘dead’ accounts, making interaction or dating impossible.”
According to the suit, Perkins notified OKCupid to but was told by a Match Group employee that the problem was a one-time error. “Our developers are aware of the issue, and are working on a fix so this doesn’t happen going forward,” the Match Group employee said, according to the complaint. “It’s definitely not something we did on purpose, and I’m sorry to hear that this bug affected you at all.”
In the complaint, Perkins calls the response “not so much an explanation as an effort to conceal the fraud perpetrated on plaintiff and the class,” pointing to it as proof that OKCupid knew of the issue but continued to “collect premium payments” anyway.
The suit seeks to represent all users of the site who registered for the “A-List” service “during such time as a programming error, software malfunction ... or similar factor caused" the number of “likes” displayed to exceed the “actual number of persons who had liked the subscriber’s profile.”
Perkins alleges unjust enrichment, breach of contract and violation of the Illinois Consumer Fraud and Deceptive Business Practices Act, and violations of the Illinois Dating Referral Services Act.
Perkins is represented by William M. Sweetnam of Sweetnam LLC. The case is Chad Perkins et al. v. Match Group Inc. et al., case number 1:17-cv-2988, in U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Illinois.
