SAN FRANCISCO — A federal judge has sidelined a class action accusing Capital One of misleading consumers through credit card introductory offers.
In January 2025, Brandon Masjedian and Donald Nguyen filed their second amended complaint regarding the way Capital One offered cash back sign-up bonuses for cards offered under the SavorOne and Quicksilver brands.
According to the complaint, the plaintiffs and other customers didn’t get the promised $200 for spending at least $500 on the card in the first three months of having an account open. Failure to deliver on that promise, they alleged, violated the California Business and Professions Code.
In August 2025, U.S. District Judge Maxine Chesney denied Capital One’s motion to dismiss the complaint with the exception of aspects through which the plaintiffs sought an injunction. She did, however, allow for the chance to amend those pleadings.
Chesney said she acted again in October when the customers failed to further amend their complaint by staging a case management conference. She ordered limited initial discovery, but that made it apparent, contrary to the foundational allegations, that “plaintiffs had applied for and received a credit card that was not eligible for a sign-up bonus.”
Capital One moved for summary judgment, which Chesney granted in an order filed July 2. Although she agreed the initial allegations were sufficiently broad so as to support the customers’ more recent legal theory that Capital One advertising deceived them “at the outset” of the application and approval process, she sided with Capital One on the relevance of the National Bank Act (NBA).
“Plaintiffs appear to assert Capital One ‘could have included’ disclosures ‘requir(ing) plaintiffs to acknowledge that they read a term that they were ineligible for the bonus’ and displaying a ‘statement suggesting that they could be pre-approved for a different SavorOne card,’ ” Chesney wrote, but the NBA bars any litigation that would force a company to comply with disclosure requirements beyond what federal law dictates.
Chesney did say claims based on advertising that was allegedly misleading weren’t pre-empted, but did explain why the promotional materials didn’t fall outside what is legally acceptable. She said both plaintiffs, as they went through the preapproval process on the Capital One website, encountered a statement under the New Card Member Offer heading reading: “You’ll earn the usual SavorOne dining and entertainment rewards, but won’t be eligible for new cardmember bonus cash or 0% intro APR.”
When viewing potential cards after the preapproval process, Chesney continued, neither customer encountered an option including a bonus cash offer. After advancing to the actual application stage, she continued, an Offer Terms link led to similar disclosures clarifying the cash back program wasn’t available. Neither customer clicked on that link, but both eventually submitted applications and then received emails again indicating there would be no bonus cash or interest rate incentives.
The customers argued that either Capital One used “bait and switch” techniques or that it misled them to believe the card they got came with the desired sign-up bonus. Neither theory was sufficient, Chesney said, explaining their framing of classic bait-and-switch marketing was incorrect and further explaining Capital One met its obligations to disclose the true nature of its offer.
Chesney said Capital One didn’t hide its disclosures in fine print, bury it in other promotional language or wait until too late in the process to make customers aware of the situation.
“To the extent plaintiffs assert they ‘did not expect to be pre-approved for a lower tier of the SavorOne card that they were not warned of and did not know existed,’ their argument is not persuasive,” Chesney wrote. “Although, as plaintiffs note, the card that came with the sign-up bonus and the card for which they were approved were both orange and bore the words ‘SavorOne,’ it was clear from the outset that, for each card brand, there were multiple cards in a single color and bearing the same name; additionally, the specific name for each such card appeared prominently and immediately under the picture of the card along with the type of credit needed for that card.”
Each card name included the phrase “good credit,” which Chesney said was adequate distinction “from their excellent credit counterparts.” Reasonable consumers would not have misunderstood the difference she said, and Capital One is entitled to summary judgment.
Masjedian and Nguyen are represented by attorneys from the firm of Tycko & Zavareei, of Oakland and Washington, D.C.
Capital One is represented by attorneys from the firm of Covington & Burling, of San Francisco and Washington, D.C.
