Opinion ID: 3044256
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Prohibitive-Cost Defense

Text: Escobar points out that the Supreme Court has observed, albeit in dicta, that the effective-vindication doctrine “would perhaps cover filing and administrative fees attached to arbitration that are so high as to make access to the forum impracticable.” Italian Colors, 570 U.S. at ___, 133 S. Ct. at 2310–11; see also Green Tree Fin. Corp.–Ala. v. Randolph, 531 U.S. 79, 90, 121 S. Ct. 513, 522 (2009) (“It may well be that the existence of large arbitration costs could preclude a litigant . . . from effectively vindicating her federal statutory rights in the arbitral forum.”). The “party seek[ing] to invalidate an arbitration agreement on the ground that arbitration would be prohibitively expensive . . . bears the burden of showing the likelihood of incurring such costs.” Green Tree, 531 U.S. at 92, 121 S. Ct. at 522. The mere existence of a cost-splitting clause in an arbitration agreement does not satisfy a plaintiff’s burden to prove the likelihood of prohibitive costs. See Musnick v. King Motor Co. of Fort Lauderdale, 325 F.3d 1255, 1259 (11th Cir. 2003). Rather, a party invoking the effective-vindication doctrine because the cost 14 To the extent that Escobar contends that the cost of arbitration renders his claims not worth pursuing, we must reject that argument. As the Supreme Court has stated, “the fact that [arbitrating] is not worth the expense involved in proving a statutory remedy does not constitute the elimination of the right to pursue that remedy.” Italian Colors, 570 U.S. at ___, 133 S. Ct. at 2311. 22 Case: 14-11793 Date Filed: 06/25/2015 Page: 23 of 26 of arbitration is prohibitively expensive must present evidence of two things: (1) “the amount of the fees he is likely to incur;” and (2) “his inability to pay those fees.” Id. at 1260. Speculative fear of high fees is insufficient. Id. Notably, the Supreme Court did not apply the effective-vindication doctrine in Italian Colors or Green Tree. And we can find no court that has applied it in the context of a New York Convention case.15