J.B. Hunt Transport Services Inc. has agreed to pay $3.18 million to settle a proposed class action brought by employees who say they were overcharged for health insurance simply because they used tobacco products. The company, headquartered in Lowell, reached the deal in mediation with two workers who filed suit earlier this year over a $15 weekly surcharge tacked onto their premiums.
The lawsuit, filed in June in the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Arkansas, Fayetteville Division, was brought by Michael Barker and George Cross on behalf of themselves and other settlement class members who paid tobacco surcharges under the J.B. Hunt Transport Inc. Employee Benefits Plan, according to court documents cited by the Northwest Arkansas Democrat-Gazette. The suit alleged the plan imposed the $15-per-week charge without providing a compliant reasonable alternative standard or the required notice in plan materials discussing the surcharge. Law360 reported the same underlying dispute, noting J.B. Hunt had struck a deal to settle claims that tobacco-using workers were wrongly charged the extra weekly fee for healthcare.
Court had not granted class action status in the case, according to court documents, when J.B. Hunt and the employees reached their settlement agreement in mediation. That agreement was documented in filings made in mid-September, and the company filed an unopposed motion for preliminary settlement approval on November 10. A separate Law360 report pegged the settlement figure at roughly $3.2 million, consistent with the $3.18 million sum cited in the court filings.
A Federal Rule at the Center of the Dispute
Federal regulations addressing workplace wellness programs specifically contemplate situations like the one described in the lawsuit. Under 29 CFR 2590.702, references to a plan providing a reward include imposing a penalty, such as a surcharge or another financial or nonfinancial disincentive — language that frames how tobacco surcharges are treated under federal wellness-program rules governing group health plans.
J.B. Hunt is not alone in facing this kind of challenge. The tobacco-surcharge dispute fits into a broader pattern of litigation hitting large employers over similar health-plan fees. Reports on the scope of that wave conflict: one account from Insurance Business put the number of substantially similar ERISA class actions filed in federal courts nationwide at more than 50, including more than 30 filed in 2026 alone, while a separate Insurance Business report described the litigation wave as spanning more than 80 cases, also with more than 30 filed this year.
Other Employers Caught Up in Similar Fights
Mondelez International was named as another large employer targeted in the wave of ERISA class actions challenging health-plan tobacco surcharges, according to Insurance Business. In a separate case, Mehlberg v. Compass Group USA, a judge ruled against Compass Group on the claims at issue, finding the Fortune 500 foodservice company violated ERISA by failing to retroactively reimburse a $1,248-per-year tobacco penalty to employees who had completed a cessation program, the outlet reported.
Research on tobacco surcharges more broadly has flagged compliance gaps among employers. A Health Affairs study found that wellness-program prevalence was lower in states that allowed tobacco surcharges, and that 10.8 percent of employers in those states were noncompliant with the Affordable Care Act by charging tobacco users higher premiums without offering cessation programs.
The J.B. Hunt case now awaits the next step in the settlement process after the company's unopposed motion for preliminary approval, filed earlier this month. The underlying claims — including the amount individual employees might ultimately receive and how any settlement fund would be administered — have not been detailed in the court filings reviewed so far.
