The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau today released its Notice of Proposed Rulemaking to implement the Fair Debt Collection Practices Act. Years in the making, the proposed rules if adopted would bring significant changes to the form and manner of debt collector communications to consumers, credit reporting and litigation activity. Interested parties will have 90 days from publication in the Federal Register to submit comments to the rules. The rules are available here. The Notice of Proposed Rulemaking covers a wide array of material; we look at a few of the most significant proposals below. Call Frequency Cap The NPRM would…
Posts tagged as “CFPB”
An online lender that extends payday and unsecured installment loans reached a settlement with the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau regarding “unfair, deceptive, or abusive acts or practices” allegations that the lender unlawfully debited consumers’ bank accounts without authorization and failed to honor loan extensions to its customers. Under the terms of the settlement and consent order, the lender is barred from making or initiating electronic fund transfers without valid authorization, and must pay a $3.2 million civil monetary penalty. A copy of the consent order is available at: Link to Consent Order. The respondent, an online lender, extends and services…
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit held that a civil investigative demand (CID) issued by the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau did not adequately advise the respondent of the nature of the conduct constituting the alleged violation under investigation and the provision of law applicable to such violation. Accordingly, the Fifth Circuit reversed the ruling of the trial court granting the CFPB’s petition for an order to enforce the CID. A copy of the opinion in Consumer Financial Protection Bureau v. The Source for Public Data, L.P. is available at: Link to Opinion. Under 12 U.S.C. § 5562(c)(1), the…
The U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Ohio issued its highly anticipated ruling on July 25 in a CFPB enforcement action against an Ohio debt collection law firm, concluding that the firm’s attorneys were “meaningfully involved” in the collections process and entering judgment in favor of the law firm. The decision followed an advisory jury’s verdict, which found the law firm’s pre-suit collection letters contained “false, deceptive, or misleading representations or means in connection with the collection of a debt” while rejecting a claim that the firm’s attorneys were not meaningfully involved in the debt collection process in…
In a follow up to an advisory jury’s verdict, finding that a law firm’s pre-suit collection letters contained “false, deceptive, or misleading representations or means in connection with the collection of a debt” while rejecting a claim that the firm’s attorneys were not meaningfully involved in the debt collection process in violation of the federal Fair Debt Collection Practices Act, the accused law firm filed its proposed findings of fact and conclusions of law on June 29, arguing that if their legal services were good enough for Richard Cordray when he held the office of Attorney General of the State…
In a follow-up to an advisory jury’s verdict, finding that a law firm’s pre-suit collection letters contained “false, deceptive, or misleading representations or means in connection with the collection of a debt” while rejecting a claim that the firm’s attorneys were not meaningfully involved in the debt collection process in violation of the FDCPA, the CFPB filed its proposed findings of fact and conclusions of law on June 15, suggesting that the jury’s verdict was misguided. Instead, the CFPB asserted that the applicable facts and law support a conclusion that attorneys with the law firm were in fact not “meaningfully…
In the final few pages of a 108 page opinion of a motion to dismiss a complaint jointly filed by the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) and the Attorney General of the State of New York (NYAG), a Federal Judge sitting in the Southern District of New York declined to follow an earlier ruling from the Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit but instead adopted the dissent which held that “the CFPB is unconstitutionally structured because it is an independent agency that exercises substantial executive power and is headed by a single Director.” A copy of the…
By Brent Yarborough and Eric Rosenkoetter On June 13, the Bureau of Consumer Financial Protection issued a consent order with a holding company and its affiliated operating entities engaged in consumer lending. The consent order reflects the parties’ settlement of an administrative enforcement action that focused on the lenders’ debt collection and credit reporting practices. The lenders neither admitted nor denied the Bureaus’ findings or conclusions, but as part of the settlement they are required, among other things, to pay a civil money penalty of $5 million and to refrain from making in-person visits for collection purposes. This is the second consent order…
An advisory jury, empaneled pursuant to Federal Rule 39(c)(1), recently returned an inconsistent verdict after trial in an action brought by the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau last year challenging that attorneys of a law firm specializing in the collection of debts were not “meaningfully involved” in collection activities engaged in by the firm in violation of the federal Fair Debt Collection Practices Act. A copy of the complaint in Consumer Financial Protection Bureau v. Weltman, Weinberg & Reis Co., L.P.A. is available at: Link to Complaint. The jury determined that the law firm’s pre-suit collection letters contained “false, deceptive, or misleading representations or…
The future of federal rules covering debt collection has been thrown into doubt amid the leadership change at the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. In one of his first actions since taking the helm of the CFPB as acting director, Mick Mulvaney announced a halt on all Bureau rulemaking, reported Reuters. It has been more than four years since the CFPB announced plans to propose the first-ever rules regulating debt collectors subject to the federal Fair Debt Collection Practices Act. Last year it issued an outline of what those rules might look like. The Bureau had indicated earlier this year that…
The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau and Department of Justice recently entered into a Consent Order with an automobile finance company for alleged violations of the federal Equal Credit Opportunity Act, 15 U.S.C. §§ 1691 (ECOA), arising from the auto finance company’s policies and practices allowing car dealer discretion for interest rate markups. A copy of the consent order is available at: Link to Consent Order. A copy of the related DOJ complaint is available at: Link to Complaint. In connection with sales of cars on credit, car dealers frequently submit credit applications to auto finance companies on behalf of their…
The federal Consumer Financial Protection Bureau issued a brief press release yesterday, confirming reports that it would be issuing a proposed amendment to delay the effective date for the “Know Before You Owe” TILA-RESPA Integrated Disclosure (TRID) rule until Oct. 1, 2015. A copy of the press release is available at: Press Release. The press release simply states: “The CFPB will be issuing a proposed amendment to delay the effective date of the Know Before You Owe rule until October 1, 2015. We made this decision to correct an administrative error that we just discovered in meeting the requirements under federal law,…