Law360, New York ( September 21, 2016, 11:55 AM EDT) -- California's Automatic Purchase Renewals Statute (ARL) became effective in December 2010, and was enacted by the Legislature with the stated intent of ending the practice of charging a consumer's credit card, on an ongoing basis, without the consumer's express consent. While enacted to target fly-by-night and illicit business models, the statute in recent years has been exploited by parties targeting businesses that make transparent disclosures about auto-renewal policies but allegedly fail in some way to address the onerous details that the statute requires. In some instances, these parties claim that the statute imposes liability for violations regardless of whether any consumer was actually confused. ...