Class Actions Brief Blog

Depositions are a mainstay of modern discovery. For corporate litigants, the affirmative duties that Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 30(b)(6) imposes often require significant investment to prepare corporate representatives. In class actions, those burdens can multiply quickly.

But Rule 30 also offers corporations a safeguard: protection against serial depositions. This blog post addresses that protection.

Spotting Serial Depositions in Class Actions

In a typical case, parties issue 30(b)(6) deposition notices with a list of topics for examination. The parties meet and confer about the topics, and corporate representatives then testify at depositions.

Class actions create unique pressure points for corporate representatives. For instance, the following scenarios may arise in class litigation:

• Scenario A: Multiple plaintiffs each want their own shot to depose the corporate defendant. One party notices a 30(b)(6) deposition, the deposition is held, and then another party subsequently serves a new 30(b)(6) notice on the same topics.
• Scenario B: Counsel completes 30(b)(6) depositions before the court certifies a class. After certification, new issues surface. Counsel then notices a second 30(b)(6) deposition for the same corporation with additional topics relating to those new issues.
• Scenario C: Opposing counsel “holds open” a corporate representative’s deposition and later serves a second 30(b)(6) notice styled as an amendment to the first. The purported “amended notice” adds “follow-up” topics or identifies topics from the original notice that, in their view, the corporate representative was not prepared to address.

Attorneys can invoke Rule 30 to protect against each of these scenarios to safeguard corporate resources.

Rule 30 and Its Safeguards

When a “deponent has already been deposed in the case,” any party seeking a second deposition must obtain leave of court or a stipulation from all parties. Fed. R. Civ. P. 30(a)(2)(A)(ii).

The Advisory Committee introduced this protection in the 1993 Amendments alongside the ten-deposition-per-side limit. Their stated goal was to ensure judicial review and emphasize counsel’s duty to employ cost-effective discovery strategies. In 2000, the Committee added the presumptive seven-hour durational cap. In 2007, the Committee revised the rule’s language from “the person to be examined” to “the deponent.” This stylistic change, as discussed below, has substantive implications for 30(b)(6) depositions.

Most federal courts have held that Rule 30(a)(2)(A)(ii) applies to 30(b)(6) deponents. Thus, once a corporation has been deposed under Rule 30(b)(6), any subsequent 30(b)(6) deposition of that same entity — by any party — triggers the leave-of-court requirement. See Ameristar Jet Charter, Inc. v. Signal Composites, Inc., 244 F.3d 189, 192 (1st Cir. 2001); see also St. John Haney v. Kavoukjian, No. 2:19-2098-RMG, 2020 WL 12762510, at *4–5 (D.S.C. Dec. 17, 2020) (describing split in case law and adopting the majority view); UWorld LLC v. USMLE Galaxy LLC, 349 F.R.D. 258, 266–67 (N.D. Tex. 2025) (same).

That protection applies with full force to class actions. See In re Sulfuric Acid Antitrust Litig., No. 03 C 4576, 2005 WL 1994105, at *2–5 (N.D. Ill. Aug. 19, 2005); Sanchez v. Sam’s W., Inc., No. 2:21-CV-05122-SVW-JC, 2024 WL 4131841, at *9, *12 (C.D. Cal. Feb. 9, 2024). Cf. Kosek v. Ethicon, Inc., No. 18 C 7477, 2020 WL 6203310, at *5–6 (N.D. Ill. Oct. 22, 2020) (applying heightened scrutiny to request to revisit a 30(b)(6) deposition in the MDL context).

Applying Rule 30

Scenarios A and B plainly violate Rule 30. The rule makes no exception for different noticing parties or proposed topics noticed after a 30(b)(6) deposition.

In Scenario C, the serving party seemingly sidesteps Rule 30(a)(2)(A)(ii) by styling the second notice as an “amendment.”

But as one judge explained in rejecting such a notice, “If all a lawyer had to do to circumvent the one-deposition limit in Fed. R. Civ. P. 30(a)(2)(A)(ii) was to announce at the end of the day that he was keeping a deposition open, the rule’s limit would lose all force.” Griffith v. Merrill, No. 4:14-md-02566-NMG, Dkt. No. 2032 (D. Mass. May 6, 2024) (electronic order granting defendant’s emergency motion for protective order). As for the underlying objection that the entity failed to prepare its designated representative, a party’s remedy is under Rule 37, not Rule 30.

A Wrinkle from the Eastern District of North Carolina: Quality Aero and Its Progeny

In North Carolina, one federal district court reasoned that 30(b)(6) depositions “are different from depositions of individuals” and the protections of Rule 30(a)(2)(A)(ii) therefore do not apply. Quality Aero Tech., Inc. v. Telemetrie Elektronik GmbH, 212 F.R.D. 313, 319 (E.D.N.C. 2002). This reasoning has influenced some courts in other jurisdictions. See Sullivan v. Saint-Gobain Performance Plastics Corp., No. 5:16-CV-125, 2019 WL 8272776, at *5 (D. Vt. Aug. 28, 2019) (assuming that “leave of court to take a second Rule 30(b)(6) deposition might be unnecessary in some [class actions]”).

Wright & Miller’s Federal Practice and Procedure also acknowledges this minority view. The treatise explains that the primary objective of the one-deposition limit in Rule 30(a) is to guard against burdens on any individual deponent. A corporation may designate multiple corporate representatives to alleviate that burden. 8A Charles Alan Wright & Arthur R. Miller, Federal Practice and Procedure § 2104 (3d ed. April 2026 Update).

But Rule 30(a)(2)(A)(ii) protections still prevail after Quality Aero and its progeny.

In 2021, the Eastern District of North Carolina expressed doubt about its earlier holding, particularly after the 2007 Amendments. The rule now requires leave of court or party stipulation when the “deponent” has already been deposed — not “the person.” See Infernal Tech., LLC v. Epic Games, Inc., 339 F.R.D. 226, 230 n.4 (E.D.N.C. 2021) (rejecting Quality Aero as inconsistent with the revised language of Rule 30). Most courts in other jurisdictions have also declined to adopt Quality Aero’s reasoning. See UWorld, 349 F.R.D. at 267.

Bottom Line

Rule 30 offers powerful protections to corporations, particularly in the class-action context.

Those protections, however, are not absolute. Rule 30(a)(2) directs courts to grant leave for a second deposition to the extent consistent with Rule 26(b)(1) and (2).

But where the corporation has already been deposed, an adept attorney may successfully argue that those considerations — including that the party seeking discovery already had ample opportunity to obtain the information sought — weigh against granting leave. See, e.g., Heredia v. Tate, No. 19-CV-338-JDP, 2021 WL 5446872, at *8 (W.D. Wis. Nov. 22, 2021) (denying leave to class plaintiffs to take a second 30(b)(6) deposition in part because the plaintiffs were seeking the same information through written discovery).

Robinson Bradshaw attorneys are available to guide clients through the discovery process. Contact the authors for more information.