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Walmart Settlement: Grocery Shoppers Can Get up to $500 From Class Action Lawsuit
By Pete Grieve MONEY RESEARCH COLLECTIVE
The deadline for claims is June 5.
Have you recently shopped for groceries at Walmart? You may be eligible to claim up to $500 from a major class action lawsuit over allegedly misleading prices.
To qualify for a share of the $45 million settlement, you need to have purchased certain products at a Walmart store between Oct. 19, 2018, and Jan. 19, 2024.
The groceries that qualify include specific meat, poultry, pork and seafood items that are priced based on weight, as well as some produce items (oranges, grapefruit and tangerines) that are sold in bulk in bags — like 3-pound bags of oranges.
You can view the complete list of items on the product descriptions tab of the settlement administrator’s website. Keep in mind that only in-person (not online) purchases qualify.
Why is this settlement happening? The lawsuit claimed that shoppers were overcharged and “paid more than the lowest in-store advertised price” for the products in question, according to the settlement website. Walmart continues to deny that claim, and a settlement is not an admission of a mistake.
How to claim money from the Walmart settlement
Some Walmart shoppers who are eligible to take part in the settlement received emails containing a notice ID and confirmation code; that information can be used to quickly submit a claim online.
The settlement amount is 2% of the purchases you made, up to a total of $500. Payments will be distributed via online methods like Venmo or Zelle, but there’s also a backup option to receive a check. (Payout amounts could be adjusted depending on how many claims are submitted.)
Realistically, very few people will qualify for the maximum amount — you’d have to average just under $5,000 of annual spending on the qualifying items to be eligible for the $500 payout. Also, claiming your part of the settlement will be more complicated if your purchases were not tied to an email on file with Walmart.
Shoppers who kept their receipts or have other proof of purchase can upload those with their claim and potentially receive a larger sum (up to the $500 max). If you don’t have receipts or purchase records, you can submit a detailed claim form and potentially receive between $10 and $25 based on the number of qualifying products you attest to having purchased.
For all claims, the submission deadline is June 5.
The timing of when people will be paid out is unknown: A final approval hearing is scheduled for June 12, but there may be appeals after that.
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Pete Grieve is a New York-based reporter who covers personal finance news. At Money, Pete covers trending stories that affect Americans’ wallets on topics including car buying, insurance, housing, credit cards, retirement and taxes. He studied political science and photography at the University of Chicago, where he was editor-in-chief of The Chicago Maroon. Pete began his career as a professional journalist in 2019. Prior to joining Money, he was a health reporter for Spectrum News in Ohio, where he wrote digital stories and appeared on TV to provide coverage to a statewide audience. He has also written for the San Francisco Chronicle, the Chicago Sun-Times and CNN Politics. Pete received extensive journalism training through Report for America, a nonprofit organization that places reporters in newsrooms to cover underreported issues and communities, and he attended the annual Investigative Reporters and Editors conference in 2021. Pete has discussed his reporting in interviews with outlets including the Columbia Journalism Review and WBEZ (Chicago's NPR station). He’s been a panelist at the Chicago Headline Club’s FOIA Fest and he received the Institute on Political Journalism’s $2,500 Award for Excellence in Collegiate Reporting in 2017. An essay he wrote for Grey City magazine was published in a 2020 book, Remembering J. Z. Smith: A Career and its Consequence.