Alan S. Kaplinsky is a senior partner and Practice Leader of the more than 110-person Consumer Financial Services Group at Ballard Spahr LLP which was recently named by Law 360 a Banking Law Practice Group of the year.  He devotes his practice exclusively to: (i) counseling financial services companies with respect to bank regulatory and transactional matters, particularly consumer financial services law, and (ii) defending them when they are sued by consumers and governmental enforcement agencies in individual and class action lawsuits.  Alan was the first president of the American College of Consumer Financial Services Lawyers, an organization founded in order to honor those lawyers who have made substantial contributions to the development of consumer financial services law.  In April of 2016, he received the American College’s Lifetime Achievement Award.  He is a past chair of the Committee on Consumer Financial Services of the Section of Business Law of the American Bar Association.  He has been named as a tier one banking and consumer financial services lawyer in the 2006-2018 editions of Chambers USA: America’s Leading Lawyers for Business, a directory of America’s leading lawyers.  In 2015, Alan was named as a “Trailblazer” by the National Law Journal because of his pioneering work related to consumer arbitration provisions.  For 24 years, he has annually co-chaired for Practicing Law Institute its Annual Institute on Consumer Financial Services in New York, Chicago and San Francisco.  His group recently received the 2018 Readers’ Choice Awards from JD Supra, including the Top Firm Award in Banking and Finance.  Alan earned Top Author honors in Banking and Finance and was ranked #1 in Class Actions.  He was recently awarded the National Law Review’s “Go-To Thought Leadership Award in Consumer Finance” for his work on the Firm’s Consumer Finance Monitor blog which Alan launched in 2011.  Alan recently launched a companion podcast series known as Consumer Finance Monitor.

John is a partner in Bailey & Glasser’s Boston office. His practice is devoted to representing consumers in class actions, challenging unfair and deceptive business practices, and serving as relator’s counsel in qui tam “whistleblower” actions. In the last two decades the settlements in cases he has litigated have returned more than $850 million to consumers harmed by marketplace misconduct. John regularly writes and speaks on class action practice and consumer financial services law, and has published dozens of articles on these topics. He is a fellow of the American College of Consumer Financial Services Lawyers, and serves on the Consumer Financial Services Law Report Board of Advisors, the Advisory Board of the Massachusetts Appleseed Foundation, and the National Consumer Law Center Partners Council. He is a member of the National Association of Consumer Advocates and the Volunteer Lawyers Project. John has co-chaired PLI’s Annual Consumer Financial Services Institute for the past 17 years.

Widely recognized as one of the best litigators in the country, Julia Strickland leads a broad national practice that focuses on the defense of class actions and other complex actions. Ms. Strickland is regularly called by major financial services companies and others when they are confronted with complex issues that put them at substantial economic and reputational risk. She is a member of the firm’s Executive Committee, Managing Partner of the Los Angeles office, and head of the firm’s national Financial Services Litigation, Regulation and Enforcement Group.

In addition to her experience defending complex and class actions through dispositive motion practice, trial and/or appeal, Ms. Strickland has settled all types of complex and class actions. She is versatile and creative in addressing settlement considerations, both legal and business, and in developing settlement structure options unique to the particular case. She also routinely represents companies in compliance counseling, regulatory proceedings and responding to claims by federal and state regulators and enforcement authorities. Representative clients include JPMorgan Chase, HSBC, TransUnion, Discover, American Express, Citigroup, HSBC, PayPal, BMW Financial Services, Zappos and Synchrony Bank, among others.

Ms. Strickland once again received top honors in Chambers USA 2018 with a Band 1 ranking in the Financial Services Regulation: Consumer Finance Litigation–Nationwide category.  Ms. Strickland is one of only three attorneys across the country to receive this recognition. She was also selected by Law360 as a 2017 Banking MVP joining an elite slate of only six lawyers nationally who have distinguished themselves from their peers.

For more than 13 years running, The Los Angeles Daily Journal has named Ms. Strickland one of California’s “Top Women Lawyers.” The Los Angeles Business Journal honored Ms. Strickland in their Leader in Law awards, naming her one of their “Lawyers of the Year” for 2016 and 2017, and she was recognized by leading corporate counsel as a member of the BTI Consulting Group’s “Client Services All-Stars” for her “uncanny ability to anticipate opposing counsel,” as well as being “very customer focused and practical.” She has also been repeatedly recognized by Super Lawyers, Benchmark Litigation, The Los Angeles Times and Best Lawyers.

Beth E. Terrell is a 1995 graduate of University of California, Davis Martin Luther King, Jr. Hall School of Law, Order of the Coif. She is a founding member of Terrell Marshall Law Group PLLC, located in Seattle. Beth’s practice focuses on complex litigation, including the prosecution of consumer fraud, defective product, and wage and hour class actions. She has been co-lead counsel on many multi-state and nationwide class actions against Fortune 100 and 500 companies such as Wal-Mart, Microsoft, Best Buy, Sallie Mae, Bank of America, and Capital One. Beth has been awarded an “AV” rating in Martindale Hubbell by her peers, a rating denoting the highest legal ability and ethical standards, and has been recognized as a “Superlawyer.” Beth frequently speaks at CLEs and other seminars on issues as diverse as ESI, class actions, and mandatory arbitration, and is active in the bar and community, serving on a number of non-profit boards.