Howard Feinstein wasn’t expecting much when he submitted his information to a lawsuit against Juul Labs that accused the vaping corporation of misleading customers about the addictiveness and safety of their products.

Then more than $3,000 (£2,320) hit his financial institution account.

“I thought it was fake at first,” said the 55-year-ancient real estate agent, who lives in Washington state. “I was absolutely shocked.”

The settlement to Mr Feinstein this week was one of more than 800,000 that the corporation is making to former customers as a outcome of a more than $300m court settlement finally approved earlier this year.

The payouts range from $15 to more than $10,000, with an average of about $240, said Dena Sharp of the San Francisco law firm Girard & Sharp, who was the navigator attorney on the case.

Administrators of the settlement, which involved Juul and tobacco giant Altria, which previously held a sizable stake in the corporation, started mailing checks late last week. Electronic payments began on Monday.

Ms Sharp said more payments would be sent out over the next few days.

“Please continue to be patient and provide us a little bit of period to procedure these claims,” she said.

More than 14 million people submitted claims to the court, of which only about 842,000 were officially validated.

Ms Sharp said the court followed a careful procedure to winnow the claims, looking for duplicates, signs of fraud and proof of purchase.

About a quarter of the recipients purchased directly from the corporation, making their eligibility easier to verify, she said.

The lawsuit alleged two things: that Juul customers paid more for the product than they would have had they been provided with accurate information about its addictiveness and safety, and that the products were unlawfully marketed to minors.

The court did not decide whether either firm violated any laws.

In a statement, Juul Labs said they are “pleased to have resolved the vast majority of the corporation’s history legal issues and are concentrated on advancing our mission”, which they added included reducing the use of their products by underage users.

Many of the people receiving payouts, like Mr Feinstein, have been pleasantly surprised by the sums, and have taken to social media to celebrate their haul.

“The money couldn’t have arrive at a better period so I’m really grateful that they’re following through,” Mr Feinstein said, adding that he might use some of the money to pay down his financing card debt.

Mr Feinstein said he started smoking cigarettes at the age of 16 and tried multiple methods to quit. Eventually vaping stuck.

For a few years, he was a faithful Juul customer, consuming a pod roughly every three days, and for several months participating in regular surveys the corporation conducted collecting data about his health and usage.

He eventually switched to other brands because of the expense, he said.

He said he felt that Juul had been unfairly singled out among vaping companies by regulators.

“I am grateful that we got the settlement but I don’t ponder it was fair,” he confessed. “Does that make me a hypocrite? I don’t recognize.”