He lost because of a forced arbitration clause. This massive privatization of justice where any boilerplate service or product now comes with forced arbitration is making my blood boil.
The justice system should always be an option when arbitration fails, and arbitration should take no more than a reasonable time to fail (say, two weeks for this $5000 amount). The whole point of a small claims court is to handle such cases, not offload them to a dodgy corporate lawyer masquerading as a judge.
If the public service of justice is slow and expensive, we need to fix the public service, not replace it with a free market simulacrum. That's always the case with non marketable but essential public goods.
The justice system should always be an option when arbitration fails, and arbitration should take no more than a reasonable time to fail (say, two weeks for this $5000 amount). The whole point of a small claims court is to handle such cases, not offload them to a dodgy corporate lawyer masquerading as a judge.
If the public service of justice is slow and expensive, we need to fix the public service, not replace it with a free market simulacrum. That's always the case with non marketable but essential public goods.