Most confusion about whether a class action settlement is still open comes from reading the wrong document. A settlement generates at least four documents at different stages, they say different things, and the earliest one is usually the one circulating online. This is the order they are created in, what each one can and cannot tell you, and a worked example using a settlement that has now completed every stage.
Table of Contents
- The four documents, in the order they are created
- 1. The settlement agreement
- 2. The preliminary approval order
- 3. The notice and claim form
- 4. The final approval order
- The fifth thing, which is not a document
- Worked example: the LifeMD and RexMD settlement
- Why the earliest document is the one that spreads
- Checking any settlement in four steps
- Questions people ask
The four documents, in the order they are created
- The settlement agreement — signed by the parties, before the court rules.
- The preliminary approval order — the court authorises notice and sets the deadlines.
- The notice and claim form — what class members actually receive.
- The final approval order — the court approves the settlement and dismisses the case.
A fifth item, the administrator’s distribution update, is not a court document at all, and it is the one that answers the question people usually mean when they ask whether a settlement has “paid.”
1. The settlement agreement
This is the negotiated contract between the parties. It defines the class, the benefits, the release, the fee application and the injunctive terms. It is signed before a judge has ruled on anything.
What it cannot tell you: whether claims are open. Deadlines in a settlement agreement are typically expressed as intervals — so many days after preliminary approval, so many days after the notice date — because the calendar dates do not exist yet. An agreement also cannot tell you whether the court approved the deal at all, or approved it on modified terms.
2. The preliminary approval order
The court authorises notice to the class, provisionally certifies a settlement class, and fixes the calendar: the claim deadline, the exclusion deadline, the objection deadline and the date of the fairness hearing. This is the first document that contains real dates.
What it cannot tell you: whether the settlement was ultimately approved. Preliminary approval is not final approval, and the two are months apart.
3. The notice and claim form
The court-approved notice restates the deadlines in plain language, describes the benefit options, and states the consequence of doing nothing — which in a class settlement is that a class member receives no benefit and still gives up the released claims unless they opted out. The notice also names the authorised settlement website.
What it cannot tell you: whether the deadlines it prints were later extended. That happens, and only the docket or the administrator will show it.
4. The final approval order
The court approves the settlement, rules on objections and records exclusions, sets the attorneys’ fees and any class representative service awards, and dismisses the case — normally with prejudice, which resolves the released claims for every class member who did not opt out.
What it cannot tell you: when money will actually be sent. Distribution timing is operational and depends on appeal periods expiring, defendants funding, and the administrator validating claims.
The fifth thing, which is not a document
The administrator’s update on the court-authorised settlement website is where distribution dates appear. It is maintained by the administrator under the supervision of counsel and the court, and it is the only place that reflects the whole sequence at once. Court-authorised sites generally state that they are the only authorised website for the litigation and that other sites may carry incorrect information.
Worked example: the LifeMD and RexMD settlement
This settlement has now been through every stage, which makes the sequence easy to read end to end. The case is W.M.F. & Matthew Marden v. LifeMD, Inc., No. A-24-906800-C, in the District Court of Clark County, Nevada. The complaint alleged that tracking technologies on the lifemd.com and rexmd.com websites potentially disclosed individually identifiable health information to third parties including Meta, Google and TikTok. LifeMD denied the allegations. The settlement is not an admission of liability and the court made no finding.
- Settlement agreement — signed April 29–30, 2025. No court-set deadlines on its face.
- Preliminary approval — June 4, 2025. Deadlines fixed.
- Claim, exclusion and objection deadline — September 22, 2025.
- Fairness hearing and final approval — September 30, 2025; case dismissed with prejudice.
- Distribution began — January 21, 2026, per the court-authorised settlement website.
The recorded terms: a potential class of approximately 835,159 people; a benefit of $10 in cash or a $25 voucher for LifeMD or RexMD products or services valid two years; no aggregate cap on class-member benefits; $750,000 in attorneys’ fees and expenses; $2,500 to each of two class representatives, paid separately from class-member benefits; no objections and five timely exclusions. LifeMD also agreed to use a third-party consent service to strengthen consent management on its website for at least two years after the settlement became effective. A running record is kept at LifeMD & RexMD Privacy Settlement Closed: Payment Status.
Read only the April 2025 agreement and the settlement looks open. Read the September 30, 2025 final approval order and it is closed. Read the administrator’s update and it has paid. All three documents are genuine; they describe different moments.
Why the earliest document is the one that spreads
A settlement agreement is the first public artefact in the sequence, it is a single downloadable file, and it is often the only one that circulates as a PDF. Preliminary approval orders, notices, final approval orders and distribution updates are each later, each less frequently copied, and the last of them is a web page rather than a file. The document with the longest head start is therefore the one least likely to reflect the current state.
The general rule that follows: read the last document in the sequence, not the first.
Checking any settlement in four steps
- Find the court-authorised website, and confirm a court document names it. A site no order or notice names is a third-party site.
- Read the deadline and the date it was set, then check whether a later order changed it.
- Look for the final approval order. If one exists, the claim window is closed.
- Look for a distribution update. That, not the court order, is where payment timing appears.
A closed settlement does not always mean nothing remains. A release binds only the class as it was defined, so people outside that definition are unaffected by it. In the LifeMD example the class covered members and purchasers; attorneys are separately investigating potential cases for alleged privacy violations in California concerning whether intake questionnaires on LifeMD and its Rex MD and ShapiroMD brands passed visitors’ answers to third-party advertising networks before those visitors accepted the terms or created an account. That review is limited to California residents who started a questionnaire on or before June 14, 2026 and who never accepted the terms, created an account or made a purchase. No complaint has been filed and no class has been certified. The criteria are published on the LifeMD data privacy investigation page.
Questions people ask
Which settlement document says whether claims are still open?
None of them says it on its own. The claim deadline is set in the preliminary approval order and restated in the court-approved notice. Whether that deadline has passed is a matter of the calendar, and whether a later order changed anything is shown by the final approval order. The court-authorised settlement website is the only source that reflects all of them at once.
Is the settlement agreement the official document?
It is an official document, but it is the earliest one and it is signed before the court acts. It typically carries no court-set deadlines, because those are filled in at preliminary approval. A settlement agreement alone cannot tell you whether a claim window is open.
What does a final approval order tell me?
That the court approved the settlement, resolved objections and exclusions, set the awarded fees and service payments, and dismissed the case. It confirms the claim window is closed. It does not usually state when payments will be sent.
Where do I find out when payments went out?
The court-authorised settlement website, which the administrator updates. Distribution dates are operational and generally appear there rather than in a court order.
How do I know a settlement website is the real one?
The final approval order and the court-approved notice name it. A site that no court document names is a third-party site, whatever it looks like. Court-authorised sites also state plainly that they are the only authorised site for the litigation.
Missing Money News is not a law firm, not a claims administrator, and is not affiliated with any party described here. This article is general information, not legal advice. The official settlement documents and the administrator’s determinations control eligibility, claim validity and payment questions in any settlement.