FEDERAL COURT SAYS OVERNIGHT DELIVERY FEES ARE SETTLEMENT SERVICES

A RESPA class action lawsuit filed in the U.S. District Court for the Central District of California ruled that overnight delivery fees constituted settlement services under the Real Estate Settlement and Procedures Act “RESPA”. The case Henson v. Fidelity National Financial Inc., 2014 WL 1246222 (C.D. Cal. March 21, 2014) alleges that Fidelity has agreements with various overnight delivery companies (i.e. UPS, Federal Express, and OnTrac) which violate RESPA when Fidelity receives “marketing” fees in exchange for referring overnight delivery business to the overnight carriers through Fidelity’s escrow subsidiaries.

The lawsuit states that Fidelity is the controlling parent of various escrow subsidiaries and these escrow subsidiaries use UPS, Federal Express, and OnTrac (the “delivery companies”) to handle overnight deliveries in connection with processing and closing federally related mortgage loans. Fidelities subsidiaries then charge escrow customers for these delivery services in the customers real estate transactions. The lawsuit alleges that Fidelity has separate, written “master” agreements with each of the delivery companies through a subsidiary of Fidelity called EC Purchasing in which EC receives a split of the charges received by the delivery carriers and kickbacks in exchange for referring delivery services to the overnight delivery companies.

The lawsuit also states that because Fidelity exercises substantial control over their subsidiaries that no “marketing” services were actually performed nor did Fidelity put in place mechanisms to ensure they were performed under the master agreement. The payments were alleged to be based on the volume of business referred. The defendants argued that overnight delivery fees or express services were not in the real estate business and thus RESPA and Regulation X did not apply. The Court held that the term “settlement service” as used in Regulation X included overnight delivery services and stated the congress did not explicitly provide an exemption in RESPA for overnight delivery services and because Congress did not provide for an exemption neither should the Court.

The Sterbcow Law Group will continue to monitor this case as it develops.