Arbitration agreement too flawed to be followed

Most every employment arbitration agreement will be declared to be procedurally unconscionable since it generally is provided on a take-it-or-leave-it basis as a condition of the job. If you add any substantive unconscionable lead to the mix, the arbitration agreement won’t be enforced.

Procedural unconscionability from the start

A lawsuit for wages and damages was filed against Defendant Fresh Venture Foods, LLC (FVF), by Juan Navas, Martha Herrera Lopez, and Benjamin Hernandez Ramos. The trial court denied FVF’s request to compel arbitration. The employees claimed—and both the trial court and the court of appeal agreed—that (1) FVF’s arbitration agreement with Lopez and Ramos wasn’t valid and (2) the arbitration agreement with Navas was procedurally and substantively unconscionable

Trial court found (1) FVF did not prove Lopez and Ramos signed the agreements and (2) “consent cannot be implied from [the] circumstances.” Ramos declared, “I do not recall seeing or signing the document. . . . I do not recognize the signature on the document as my own. . . . When I began working at Fresh Venture, I was asked to sign a bunch of paperwork very quickly. No one explained it to me, and I was never told I could take it home to read.” In her deposition, Lopez said she didn’t recognize the arbitration document. She never saw it before, and she didn’t recognize the signature on the agreement as hers