As some of you might know, Tinder has a feature called Tinder Plus which unlocks more features in the dating app, such as browsing from a different location, rewinding, and so on. It is however a subscription feature meaning that users need to pay a monthly fee if they want to keep using those features.
However if you did not know, Tinder Plus has different pricing schemes based on age, where those who are below 30 will be charged $9.99 a month, while those who are 30 and older will be charged $19.99 a month, a good $10 more, which unfortunately has been ruled as discriminatory by the US appeals court.
The lawsuit was brought by a man named Allan Candelore who argued that the difference in pricing based on age is discriminatory and violates two laws in California: the Unruh Civil Rights Act and the Unfair Competition Law. Tinder’s co-founder Sean Rad claimed that the lower pricing for the younger crowd was a “discount” for their younger users, and a lower court had initially agreed with him, except that now the decision has been reversed by the US appeals court.
The ruling reads in part, “Some older consumers will be ‘more budget constrained’ and less willing to pay than some in the younger group. We conclude the discriminatory pricing model, as alleged, violates the Unruh Act and the UCL to the extent it employs an arbitrary, class-based, generalization about older users’ incomes as a basis for charging them more than younger users.” It is unclear if Tinder plans to fight this or if it will change the way they price their Tinder Plus feature.