Settlement in Examsoft "Barmaggedon" Lawsuit

So reports the National Law Journal:

Aspiring lawyers who sat for the July 2014 bar examination are eligible for $90 each from software company ExamSoft Worldwide Inc. under a class action settlement. 

ExamSoft has agreed to pay $2.1 million to bar takers who ran into technical problems while trying to upload their exam responses last year. Ten bar takers in numerous states filed five separate lawsuits following the exam, which became known on the Internet as “Barmaggedon.” 

The cases were consolidated into one class action in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Florida, and Judge Ursula Ungaro granted preliminary approval of the settlement on Tuesday. The parties reached the agreement through mediation. The settlement includes up to $600,000 in attorney fees for the plaintiffs lawyers. 

According to the agreement, ExamSoft’s technical problems affected bar takers in 43 states. They had paid between $100 and $150 to use the software, which blocks test takers from the Internet or class notes during the essay portion of the bar exam. 

But many takers faced long delays when trying to upload their answers, causing examiners in some jurisdictions to extend deadlines at the last minute. The situation was stressful, particularly because it occurred on the first day of the two-day exam, according to the agreement.

The website describing the settlement and giving information on filing a claim is here.

I described Examsoft's technical problems as I experienced them in this post I wrote after the first day of the bar exam, and this post which I wrote after the second day. I noted on the third day that the technical problems had subsided since few states other than California had three days of testing. Additionally, it is worth noting that the event's "Barghazi" label has apparently been upgraded to "Barmaggedon."