The CARES Act contains several provisions related to higher education, some of which pertain to student loan relief...more
Section 4021 (Credit Protection During COVID-2019) of the CARES Act amends the Fair Credit Reporting Act (15 U.S.C. § 1681 et seq.) to impose new Coronavirus-related reporting requirements on furnishers of information to...more
On March 6, the Student Borrower Protection Center, Americans for Financial Reform Education Fund, the National Community Reinvestment Coalition, and the National Consumer Law Center sent a letter to the Alternative Reference...more
Taking a step that undoubtedly presages further coordinated action, state officials holding the title of Student Loan Ombudsman or comparable titles sent a joint letter to Department of Education Secretary Betsy DeVos and...more
3/6/2020
/ Consumer Financial Products ,
Department of Education ,
Disability ,
Dischargeable Debts ,
Eligibility Determination ,
Federal Student Loans ,
Financial Regulatory Reform ,
Ombudsman ,
Regulatory Agenda ,
Relief Measures ,
Students
FTC has sent its annual letter to the CFPB reporting on the FTC’s activities related to compliance with the Equal Credit Opportunity Act and Regulation B. ...more
2/25/2020
/ Consumer Financial Products ,
Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) ,
Consumer Protection Laws ,
ECOA ,
Enforcement Authority ,
Fair Lending ,
Federal Trade Commission (FTC) ,
Financial Services Industry ,
Military Service Members ,
Regulation B ,
Small Business ,
Small Business Loans
Last Monday, the CFPB announced that it had entered into a new Memorandum of Understanding with the Department of Education to replace the MOU that was terminated by the ED effective October 1, 2017. The new MOU, which is...more
2/10/2020
/ Borrowers ,
Complaint Procedures ,
Consumer Complaint Management ,
Consumer Financial Products ,
Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) ,
Consumer Lenders ,
Department of Education ,
Director Kraninger ,
Financial Services Industry ,
Memorandum of Understanding ,
Regulatory Oversight ,
Rulemaking Process ,
Student Loans ,
Supervision
The Student Borrower Protection Center has sent a letter to CFPB Director Kraninger urging her to designate the National Student Clearinghouse as a “consumer reporting agency,” supervise it as a “larger participant,” and add...more
The CFPB filed a complaint last week in a California federal district court against several companies and individuals involved in offering student loan debt relief services for allegedly obtaining consumer reports unlawfully,...more
1/14/2020
/ Civil Monetary Penalty ,
Consumer Financial Products ,
Consumer Financial Protection Act (CFPA) ,
Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) ,
Consumer Reports ,
Damages ,
Debt Relief ,
Debt-Relief Industry ,
Disgorgement ,
Enforcement Actions ,
Fair Credit Reporting Act (FCRA) ,
Financial Services Industry ,
Injunctions ,
Redress Payments ,
Regulatory Violations ,
Student Loans ,
Students ,
Telemarketing Sales Rule
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit affirmed the district court’s judgment on the pleadings in favor of the defendants (a debt buyer and a collection agency) in a putative class action that alleged the...more
The New York Department of Financial Services has sent a letter to the institutions that it regulates requiring each such institution, by February 7, 2020, to provide to DFS a description of its “plan to address its LIBOR...more
1/9/2020
/ Consumer Financial Products ,
Consumer Lenders ,
Depository Institutions ,
Federal Reserve ,
Financial Institutions ,
Financial Services Industry ,
Health Insurance ,
Housing Market ,
Libor ,
Life Insurance ,
Loans ,
Mortgages ,
Non-Depository Institutions ,
NYDFS ,
Popular ,
Property Insurance ,
Real Estate Transactions ,
Regulatory Oversight ,
Regulatory Standards ,
Secured Overnight Funding Rate (SOFR) ,
Transitional Arrangements
The CFPB has released its eighth annual report to Congress on college credit card agreements. The annual report is mandated by the CARD Act. (The first two reports were issued by the Federal Reserve Board.)...more
The CFPB has issued a special edition of its Supervisory Highlights that focuses on compliance with the FCRA and Regulation V. The report contains two main sections, with one devoted to supervisory observations at furnishers...more
12/13/2019
/ Automotive Loans ,
Consumer Financial Products ,
Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) ,
Consumer Reporting Agencies ,
Consumer Reports ,
Debt Collection ,
Delinquency Status ,
Fair Credit Reporting Act (FCRA) ,
FDCPA ,
Financial Services Industry ,
Mortgage Servicers ,
Policies and Procedures ,
Regulation V ,
Supervisory Highlights
In an 8-1 decision, the U.S. Supreme Court has ruled in Rotkiske v. Klemm that the FDCPA’s one-year statute of limitations (SOL) runs from the date of the alleged violation and not from a consumer’s discovery of the...more
12/12/2019
/ Cause of Action Accrual ,
Credit Cards ,
Debt Collection ,
Default Judgment ,
Discovery Rule ,
Equitable Tolling ,
FDCPA ,
Rotkiske v. Klemm ,
SCOTUS ,
Service of Process ,
Statute of Limitations
The OCC, Federal Reserve Board, FDIC, NCUA and CFPB have issued an “Interagency Statement on the Use of Alternative Data in Credit Underwriting.”...more
12/6/2019
/ Ability-to-Repay ,
Artificial Intelligence ,
Consumer Credit Protection ,
Consumer Financial Products ,
Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) ,
Data Management ,
FDIC ,
Federal Reserve ,
Financial Services Industry ,
Interagency Guidance ,
NCUA ,
OCC ,
Underwriting ,
Underwriting Agreements
The Department of Defense announced in its Fall 2019 rulemaking agenda that it is engaged in proposed rulemaking to amend its Military Lending Act (MLA) regulations, apparently in order to allow non-bank creditors to provide...more
12/5/2019
/ Amended Regulation ,
Automotive Industry ,
Automotive Loans ,
Borrowers ,
Consumer Lenders ,
Creditors ,
Department of Defense (DOD) ,
Fair Access to Credit ,
Financial Regulatory Reform ,
Financial Services Industry ,
Financing ,
Lenders ,
Military Lending Act ,
Military Service Members ,
Motor Vehicles ,
Non-Bank Lenders ,
Regulatory Agenda ,
Regulatory Burden ,
Rulemaking Process
A group of 22 state Attorneys General have sent a letter to the Department of Education seeking information “to determine whether the [ED] is providing relief to thousands of former ITT Tech students as required by federal...more
11/19/2019
/ Borrowers ,
Consumer Financial Products ,
Consumer Lenders ,
Consumer Loan Companies ,
Debt Relief ,
Department of Education ,
Dischargeable Debts ,
Federal Student Loans ,
Information Technology ,
State Attorneys General ,
Students
The Consumer Data Industry Association (CDIA), the world’s largest trade association whose members include consumer reporting agencies operating in the United States and throughout the world, has filed a lawsuit against the...more
The CFPB, joined by the Minnesota Attorney General’s Office, North Carolina Department of Justice, and the Los Angeles City Attorney, filed a lawsuit in the U.S. District Court for the Central District of California against...more
11/5/2019
/ Consumer Financial Products ,
Consumer Financial Protection Act (CFPA) ,
Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) ,
Debt Relief ,
Debt-Relief Industry ,
Enforcement Actions ,
Financial Services Industry ,
Regulatory Violations ,
Student Loans ,
Telemarketing Sales Rule ,
UDAP
Final regulations adopted by the New York Department of Financial Services (NYDFS) to implement the state’s new student loan servicing law became effective on October 16, 2019 upon the publication by the NYDFS of a Notice of...more
Illinois’ Democratic legislature recently passed, and its progressive Democratic Governor, J.B. Pritzker, recently signed into law, the Student Investment Account Act, which establishes a Student Investment Account to be...more
10/28/2019
/ Borrowers ,
Consumer Financial Products ,
Educational Institutions ,
Financial Regulatory Reform ,
Financial Services Industry ,
Investment Portfolios ,
Loans ,
New Legislation ,
State and Local Government ,
State Funding ,
State Treasurers ,
Student Loans
The CFPB recently published a blog post to advise consumers that LIBOR is expected be eliminated sometime after 2021 and that the change will effect some adjustable-rate loans and lines of credit. ...more
The CFPB Private Education Loan Ombudsman has issued an annual report containing an analysis of approximately 13,900 federal student loan complaints, 6,700 private student loan complaints, and 4,600 debt collection complaints...more
The New York Department of Financial Services (NYDFS) has announced the creation of a Student Debt Advisory Board to advise on consumer protection, student financial products or services, and communities that have been...more
Democratic Senators Sherrod Brown and Patty Murray have sent a letter to Robert Cameron, the CFPB’s new Private Education Loan Ombudsman, in which they set forth their expectations for the Ombudsman’s Office. The...more
On October 4, California Governor Gavin Newsom signed into law Assembly Bill 1313, which prohibits postsecondary schools from withholding transcripts as a debt collection tool. The law is effective January 1, 2020.
...more