Retail

A second law firm has filed a class action against Harvey Norman alleging it sold extended warranties to customers that had “no real value”.

Harvey Norman has been hit with a class action on behalf of customers who paid hundreds of millions of dollars for allegedly “worthless” warranties that offered zero added protection.

Mastercard is fighting an evidentiary win for the competition watchdog in a case alleging the payments giant misused its market power in deals with major retailers.

A court has held that a “nuanced” business model used by a rental company providing long-term leases to often vulnerable consumer for household items breached the Credit Act, finding the loan agreements were in substance credit contracts. Federal Court Justice Lisa Hespe found on Wednesday that Rent4Keeps attempted to avoid being caught by the Credit…

Michael Hill has won its challenge to a decision that found the jewellery retailer breached an exclusivity clause and minimum order requirements in a sales agreement with a packaging supplier. 

A Sleeping Duck shareholder has been ordered to pay the company’s costs on an indemnity basis in its failed oppression suit, with a judge finding that its decisions to reject Sleeping Duck’s buy-out offers of roughly $4 million were unreasonable.

A former EY partner and ousted board member at National Tiles has been ordered to pay indemnity costs after he lost a $1 million share dispute with the flooring company, with a judge finding he “unreasonably failed” to accept a settlement offer. 

Convenience store chain On the Run is mulling proceedings against United Petroleum, which allegedly paid $120,000 to a public relations firm to run a “misleading” ad campaign accusing it of wage theft. 

The PR firm for a franchisee class action against United Petroleum has been sued for allegedly distributing an image to group members that depicted the petrol giant as “evil” and was allegedly intended to harm its position in the class action.

Super Retail Group has lost a bid to suppress parts of a case by former chief legal officer and company secretary Rebecca Farrell, who says she was sacked in May following complaints of corporate goverance issues, as a second senior employee steps up to back her former colleague’s claims.