This photo shows the new Twitter logo, renamed X (X Corp.), on a smartphone and Elon Musk's Twitter account with the new X logo on a PC screen.
Pavlo Gonchar | flare | Getty Images
X, the social network formerly known as Twitter, is facing 2,200 arbitration lawsuits filed by former employees after Elon Musk took over the company, downsizing and making other sweeping changes. Filing fees alone for that volume of cases could add up to $3.5 million.
The arbitration figures were announced in a new submission released Monday as part of a lawsuit in a Delaware district court. The case is Chris Woodfield v. Twitter, X Corp. and Elon Musk (#1:23-cv-780-CFC).
Woodfield, a former senior network engineer who worked at Twitter's Seattle office, alleges in his lawsuit that Musk's Twitter (now known as fees required for him to advance in the JAMS arbitration system.
According to the website for JAMS“For two-party matters, the filing fee is $2,000” and “For matters based on a clause or agreement required as a condition of employment, the employee must pay only $400.”
If JAMS decides that this basic fee will be charged at a flat rate for the 2,200 arbitrations of
The company's lawyers have argued that it did not mandate its employees to resolve any issues through arbitration, so it cannot pay the bulk of the filing fees.
Meanwhile, Woodfield and others in a similar situation are trying to get out of arbitration and take their cases to court.
As CNBC previously reported, many large companies require their workers to sign an arbitration agreement upon employment, where permitted by law. This means workers must first obtain a dispensation from a judge to speak acquitted in court, where their speech may become part of a public record.
Critics see arbitration as a mysterious system that makes it difficult for workers and potential new hires to find out how companies are treating their workers and what happened to people in previous related cases.
Proponents view arbitration as a way for companies and employees to efficiently resolve their issues without employees having to pay hefty legal fees, especially if they lose their case.
The Woodfield case against Musk's X Corp. resembles another proposed class action lawsuit filed in federal court in San Francisco.
In this case, Ma v. Twitter, in the Northern District of California (#3:23-cv-3301), former Musk-era Twitter employees allege that the company delayed at least 891 arbitrations because it failed to make the requested payments Collecting fees after employees were forced to agree to arbitration of their disputes in exchange for severance pay.
