Last week, the CFPB issued its Semi-Annual Report to Congress covering the period beginning October 1, 2022 and ending March 31, 2023.

Yesterday, CFPB Director Chopra appeared before the House Financial Services Committee for a hearing, “The Semi-Annual Report of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau.”  Tomorrow, he is scheduled to appear before the Senate Banking Committee for a hearing, “The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau’s Semi-Annual Report to Congress.”

In advance of the hearings, the Consumer Bankers Association sent letters to the Chair and Ranking Member of the House and Senate committees to offer legislative and regulatory suggestions.  In the letters, CBA takes the following positions:

• Credit card late fees proposal.  The CFPB should be required to conduct a rigorous cost-benefit analysis of the proposed rule and how it would affect (1) the cost and availability of credit, particularly with respect to non-prime borrowers, (2) the safety and soundness of credit card issuers, and (3) the use of risk-based pricing.
• Section 1033 proposal.  The CFPB should broaden the scope of coverage of data providers for both asset accounts and credit products, address liability for breaches more robustly, and do more to effectively end the practice of screen scraping.
• Overdrafts.  The CFPB should not engage in overdraft rulemaking that would substantively change how banks offer overdraft services to customers until other issues such as changes to Regulation II’s allowable debit interchange amounts have been finalized and banks can assess the effects of those changes on their ability to provide free checking.  The CFPB should also conduct a cost-benefit analysis that evaluates harm to consumers when they must use non-bank services (or cannot access credit at all) when they are unable to access bank-offered overdraft services.
• Section 1034(c) advisory opinion.  The CFPB should withdraw its advisory opinion that interprets Section 1034(c) of the Consumer Financial Protection Act to prohibit large banks and credit unions from requiring a consumer to pay a fee or charge to obtain account information.  Any requirements imposed by the advisory opinion should be the subject of formal rulemaking.
• Section 1071 final rule implementation.  The court injunctions blocking implementation of the final rule until the Supreme Court issues a decision in CFSA v CFPB are expected to provide several months of additional time for lenders to comply with the rule.  However, the current implementation period is not sufficient and the CFPB should extend the deadline to 36 months after the final rule was issued to ensure that small business lenders are not forced to pause their small business lending programs to come into compliance with the rule.  

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