Opinion ID: 2780841
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Retroactivity of EFTA Amendment

Text: EFTA was amended in December 2012 to remove the requirement for an exterior fee notice on the machine. 15 U.S.C. § 1693b(d)(3)(B) (2012), as 3 Case: 13-10375 Document: 00512941786 Page: 4 Date Filed: 02/20/2015 No. 13-10375 amended by Amendment—Electronic Fund Transfer Act, P.L. 112-216, December 20, 2012, 126 Stat 1590. As a result, ATM operators are no longer required to maintain any exterior notice of fees that will be charged, although they must still provide an on-screen notice. Id. First National contends that this amendment applies retroactively. “Our starting point is the ‘deeply rooted’ presumption against retroactivity of Landgraf v. USI Film Products.” Mabary v. Home Town Bank, N.A., 771 F.3d 820, 825 (5th Cir. 2014) (citing Landgraf v. USI Film Products, 511 U.S. 244, 265 (1994)). We apply the Landgraf two-part test to determine whether a statutory amendment applies retroactively. Id. First, we “determine whether Congress unambiguously has prescribed the statute’s proper reach, determined by applying normal rules of statutory construction to the express language to determine Congress’s intent.” Id. Second, if Congress has not clearly expressed an intent to apply the statute retroactively, we determine “whether the new statute would have retroactive effect, i.e., whether it would impair rights a party possessed when he acted, increase a party’s liability for past conduct, or impose new duties with respect to transactions already completed.” Id. (quoting Landgraf, 511 U.S. at 280). If the amendment would have a retrospective effect on vested rights, the statute should not be applied retroactively, absent clear congressional intent to the contrary. See id. at 825-26. Mabary v. Home Town Bank establishes that under the Landgraf test, the 2012 EFTA amendment should not be applied retroactively to Frey’s claims. Id. at 826-27. The Mabary court found that the text of the EFTA amendment is silent as to retroactive application, and that applying the statute retroactively would have an impermissible retrospective effect by destroying a cause of action that had already accrued. See id. at 826. The court concluded that “[a]t the time Mabary’s claim arose, she had a substantive 4 Case: 13-10375 Document: 00512941786 Page: 5 Date Filed: 02/20/2015 No. 13-10375 right to two notices or statutory damages, and without clear Congressional intent to the contrary, the presumption against retroactivity restricts the application of the EFTA amendment to eliminate her claim.” Id. at 827. 1 Frey’s claim similarly accrued during the time he and others similarly situated had a right to two notices or statutory damages, and the EFTA amendment does not apply retroactively to extinguish those claims. First National also argues that, regardless of whether the EFTA amendment is retroactive, the amendment precluded certification because it took effect before the class was certified and thus before putative class members were parties to the suit. Mabary also expressly rejected this argument: “[T]he EFTA amendment poses no more a barrier for putative class members than it does for Mabary, for claims alleging violations before the amendment was enacted.” Mabary, 771 F.3d at 827. Thus, the EFTA amendment has no effect on the district court’s certification of the class and the pending class claims.