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Press release
Published

CFPB Initiates Review of Credit Card Company Penalty Policies Costing Consumers $12 Billion Each Year

The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) is taking the first step toward addressing credit card company penalty policies costing consumers $12 billion each year, starting by looking at excessive late fees. In an Advance Notice of Proposed Rulemaking published today, the CFPB asks for information on the Federal Reserve Board of Governors’ 2010 immunity provision for excessive late fees that allows credit card companies to escape enforcement scrutiny.
Press release
Published

FFIEC Announces Availability of 2021 Data on Mortgage Lending

The Federal Financial Institutions Examination Council (FFIEC) today announced the availability of data on 2021 mortgage lending transactions reported under the Home Mortgage Disclosure Act (HMDA) by 4,338 U.S. financial institutions. Covered institutions include banks, savings associations, credit unions, and mortgage companies.
Press release
Published

CFPB Launches Initiative to Improve Customer Service at Big Banks

The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) is seeking public input on how bank customers can assert their rights to better customer service with big banks. A 2010 federal law specifies that consumers have rights to obtain timely responses to requests for information about their accounts from large depository institutions. In today’s Request for Information, the CFPB seeks data about, and consumer experiences with, the obstacles that may prevent people from receiving high standards of customer service and high-quality human interactions with their banks or credit unions.
Press release
Published

CFPB Report Highlights Experiences of Military Families with Medical Billing, Credit Reporting, and Debt Collection

Today, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) released its annual report on the top financial concerns facing servicemembers, veterans, and military families, based on the complaints they submitted to the CFPB. Servicemembers told the CFPB about billing inaccuracies and that debt collectors used aggressive tactics to recover allegedly unpaid medical bills.
Press release
Published

CFPB Seeks Ban Against Operator of Student Loan Debt Relief Scam Reboot

Today the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) took action against the owner of a student-loan debt relief company for allegedly withdrawing hundreds of thousands of dollars from student borrowers’ bank accounts, without authorization. The CFPB alleges that Frank Gebase, Jr. controlled a company that took the borrowers’ money after obtaining their names and account information from a previous student-loan debt-relief scammer that the CFPB shut down.
Press release
Published

CFPB Issues Order to Terminate Upstart No-Action Letter

Today, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) issued an order to terminate Upstart Network from its list of approved “no-action letters.” The CFPB had granted special regulatory treatment to Upstart by immunizing the lender from being charged with fair lending law violations with respect to its underwriting algorithm, while the “no-action letter” remained in force. Upstart requested an amendment to the “no-action letter” that would effectively seek an immediate termination.
Press release
Published

CFPB Launches New Effort to Promote Competition and Innovation in Consumer Finance

The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) is opening a new office, the Office of Competition and Innovation, as part of a new approach to help spur innovation in financial services by promoting competition and identifying stumbling blocks for new market entrants. The office will replace the Office of Innovation that focused on an application-based process to confer special regulatory treatment on individual companies. The new office will support a broader initiative by the CFPB to analyze obstacles to open markets, better understand how big players are squeezing out smaller players, host incubation events, and, in general, make it easier for people to switch financial providers.
Press release
Published

CFPB and New York Attorney General Shut Down Debt Collection Ring

The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB), in partnership with the New York Attorney General, filed a proposed stipulated judgment in federal court to settle its case against a debt collection enterprise and its owners and managers. The judgment would order all participants in the scheme, based in upstate New York, to exit the debt collection market after their history of deception and harassment. Their debt collection companies would also be shuttered and required to pay a total of $4 million in penalties.
Press release
Published

CFPB Bolsters Enforcement Efforts by States

Today, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) issued an interpretive rule that describes states’ authorities to pursue lawbreaking companies and individuals that violate the provisions of federal consumer financial protection law. Because of the crucial role states play in protecting consumers, the Consumer Financial Protection Act grants their consumer protection enforcers the authority to protect their citizens and otherwise pursue lawbreakers.
Press release
Published

CFPB Releases Report on Mortgage Servicing Metrics

Today, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) published a report examining mortgage servicers’ responses to the COVID-19 pandemic. The data, collected across 16 large servicers from May through December 2021, reveal homeowners continue to face significant risks and challenges connected to working with their mortgage servicers.
Press release
Published

CFPB Orders Scam’s Ringleaders to Pay More Than $8 Million to Consumers and Student Loan Borrowers

Today, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) finalized an enforcement action against debt-relief payment-processors RAM Payment and Account Management Systems (AMS), as well as AMS’s co-founders, Gregory Winters and Stephen Chaya, for collecting debt-relief fees from consumers, lying to consumers about when the fees would be paid to debt-relief companies, and sending illegal advance fees to debt-relief companies before they were legally allowed to do so.
Press release
Published

CFPB Issues Advisory Opinion on Coverage of Fair Lending Laws

Today, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) published an advisory opinion to affirm that the Equal Credit Opportunity Act (ECOA)—a landmark federal civil rights law protecting individuals and businesses against discrimination in accessing and using credit—bars lenders from discriminating against customers after they have received a loan, not just during the application process.
Consumer advisories
Published

Consumer advisory: Don’t give money or information to scammers promising student loan forgiveness

Numerous student loan borrowers recently submitted complaints to the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) about companies that promised them student loan forgiveness or loan forbearance in exchange for fees amounting to hundreds or thousands of dollars. Borrowers believed they were talking to their servicer or a company authorized by the Department of Education because they often knew private information such as the borrower’s loan balance or recent consolidation activity. This is fraud.