Consumer Protection

We provide economic analysis for matters involving antitrust coordination allegations and consumer protection claims related to algorithmic pricing systems. Our work includes reverse-engineering pricing algorithms to document inputs and decision rules, conducting competitive-effects simulations comparing market outcomes under algorithmic versus manual pricing, and developing empirical tests that distinguish independent algorithmic responses from coordinated behavior.  

We also provide economic analysis in cases alleging price gouging, profiteering, excessive pricing, or breach of contract via the use of AI-based algorithms.  We assess whether the economic terms articulated in a contract comport with standard pricing principles and are consistent with the functioning of the pricing algorithm at issue, as well as analyzing the competitive landscape of the market and the presence or absence of associated market pricing constraints.   

Our work includes, when relevant, performing algorithmic bias audits examining differential treatment across consumer groups and quantify consumer welfare effects, accounting for both personalization benefits and potential price discrimination.  

In addition to our own testifying experts in the economics of pricing, we collaborate with leading academic affiliates renowned for their expertise in this sector, many of whom have authored influential, industry-shaping articles.

The Telephone Consumer Protection Act (TCPA) and related automated communications class actions often turn on the quality of the underlying record: consent and revocation evidence, call and text histories, carrier and third-party data, campaign records, and how calling or messaging systems were configured and used.

Our data, forensic, statistical, economic, and damages experts analyze those records for class certification, exposure, settlement, expert reports, rebuttal, and testimony, including in matters involving high-volume communications and complex consumer databases.

CRA helps counsel test the fit between the alleged conduct, the proposed class, the available evidence, and the damages theory.

Our experts analyze common proof, predominance, reliance, injury, restitution, damages, and value of benefit derived, including whether proposed methodologies can be applied consistently across the class and whether they reliably measure the harm alleged. We support class certification, merits, settlement, expert reports, rebuttal, and testimony.

We work on matters involving greenwashing allegations and environmental claim substantiation challenges under Canada’s Competition Act, UK CMA guidance, EU directives, and FTC Green Guides.

We review testing protocols and scientific substantiation to evaluate compliance with substantiation requirements, design surveys measuring consumer understanding of carbon neutrality and offset claims, and conduct hedonic price analyses to isolate premiums consumers pay for environmental attributes.

We analyze consumer reviews and third-party sustainability ratings to demonstrate actual market perception of environmental claims. Our economic analysis both addresses regulatory compliance and quantifies the value of benefit derived in enforcement proceedings and litigation.

We work on matters at the intersection of advertising and competition law, including allegations of false, deceptive, and misleading product claims brought under a variety of consumer protection laws in the US, Canada, the UK, Europe, and globally.  These include US Lanham Act litigation, Canadian Competition Act deceptive marketing proceedings, regulatory enforcement actions, and NAD challenges. Our work examines the alignment between marketing claims, product attributes, and consumer perception, and the resulting economic consequences including the effect of the alleged claims on market prices, profits, and injury.

Our experience includes economic analysis of class certification, liability, and damages using economic analysis and advanced econometric tools to measure how consumers respond to advertising claims, utilizing natural experiments and other quasi-experimental methods, as well as survey data, including perception surveys and conjoint analysis.  We are able to efficiently ingest and analyze very large data sets.

We work on class actions and enforcement matters involving drip pricing, fee disclosure, and pricing transparency across in North America and Europe. Our economists address “junk fees” allegations – components of prices that are alleged to be hidden, misleading, or misrepresentative of the true cost of goods and services. We evaluate, on the basis of sound theoretical and empirical economic analysis, how consumers understand and respond to pricing at different purchase stages. Our analysis quantifies consumer damages and assesses defendants’ profits attributable to challenged practices.

For class certification, our tools include transaction-level econometric analysis to assess the presence or absence of common impact across class members. For liability and damages analysis, our expertise includes conducting and responding to conjoint analysis, natural experiments, and quasi-experimental designs measuring or purporting to measure consumer price perception, purchasing behavior, and market responses. We provide expert testimony when matters proceed to litigation.

Charles River Associates helps clients assess online tracking technologies, cookie consent tools, AdTech configurations, third-party pixels, SDKs, opt-out mechanisms, CMP implementations, and data flows. Our experts review the technical record alongside user-facing disclosures and privacy policies to determine whether digital practices operated as represented and where remediation may be needed.

We also quantify the economic dimensions of privacy and data-use claims. Our methods include benchmarking the market value of comparable personal data, using willingness-to-accept surveys to measure alleged privacy harm, assessing personalization revenue and other benefits from data use, and testing consent-mechanism choice architecture through A/B analyses and survey methods. This work supports privacy enforcement matters, data broker proceedings, consent challenges, class certification, damages, remediation, rebuttal, and expert testimony.

We advise on economic loss, class certification issues, and damage assessments in product defect litigation, safety recall matters, and consumer protection actions.

Our team is experienced in analyzing transaction and return data to measure consumer response to alleged defects, conducting surveys and analyzing surveys conducted by other parties intended to measure risk perception and safety information processing, developing hedonic regression models that isolate the value consumers place on safety attributes and responding to hedonic and other regression models proposed by other parties that purport to estimate consumer value, and analyzing conjoint surveys that purport to estimate the effects of alleged product defects on market prices.

We can assess recall effectiveness by analyzing consumer participation rates and design consumer redress programs that balance administrative feasibility with adequate compensation. We also provide expert witness testimony on economic causation and damage calculation in MDL proceedings, class actions, and individual trials.