On October 18, 2023, the Federal Trade Commission (“FTC”) announced that that they had filed a complaint and entered into a stipulated order with a for-profit college and its parent company. Under the consent order, the college will cancel $3.4 million in student debt, resolving allegations that it made false claims about post-graduation job placements and…
On October 17, 2023, the Washington State Attorney General (AG) announced that over the course of 2023, they had recovered approximately $360,000 in restitution from three out-of-state debt adjusters for alleged predatory student debt adjustments in violation of the Debt Adjustment Act. The Debt Adjustment Act limits the amount of fees a debt adjuster…
On October 17, 2023, the California Attorney General announced that 48 states, Washington D.C., and Puerto Rico had reached a $10 million settlement with a payment processing company related to allegations of attempted unauthorized withdrawals related to a testing error on the part of the processing company. According to the press release,…
On October 12, 2023, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) issued a consent order and a stipulation against a parent credit reporting agency and two of its subsidiaries for for alleged violations of the Fair Credit Report Act (FCRA) and the Consumer Financial Protection Act (CFPA). The CFPB alleged that as early as…
On October 11, 2023, Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison announced a settlement with a California student loan debt relief company for $17,000. This settlement marks the 14th time AG Ellison has pursued action against student loan debt relief companies since 2016. The settlement resolves allegations that the company illegally collected fees from customers and…
The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) is moving forward with a rulemaking proposal to change the process of reporting medical debt on consumer credit reports. Specifically, the rulemaking proposal the Bureau is considering had two main parts. First, it prohibits credit reporting companies from including medical debts and collection information on…
On September 8, 2023, the United States District Court of the Eastern District of Texas granted plaintiff U.S. Chamber of Commerce’s (the “Chamber”) motion for summary judgment invalidating the Consumer Finance Protection Bureau’s (“CFPB”) Exam Manual changes from March 2022 that stated that discriminatory conduct may be a UDAAP violation….
On September 7, 2023, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) published its analysis of how smartphone companies are affecting consumers’ use of so-called “tap-to-pay” technology – the wireless transfer of data over very short distances, used in financial transactions conducted at the point of sale. Concluding that “tech companies are…
On March 30, 2023, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) issued the small business lending rule (Final Rule) which implements the small business lending data collection requirements set for in Section 1071 of the Dodd-Frank Act (Section 1071). Section 1071 amended the Equal Credit Opportunity Act (ECOA) to require financial…
On August 28, the CFPB announced it reached a proposed settlement agreement with a credit repair conglomerate for $2.7 billion. The parties await approval of the proposed settlement by the U.S. District Court for the District of Utah. In its amended complaint filed last August, the CFPB alleged that the defendant companies collected advance…
On August 17, 2023, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) announced that it had taken action against a residential mortgage loan originator that provided illegal incentives to real estate brokers and agents in exchange for mortgage loan referrals. The CFPB also penalized a real estate brokerage firm that accepted kickbacks…
On August 21, the FTC announced that the U.S. District Court of Central California issued a temporary restraining order against two companies accused of targeting students seeking debt relief and collecting $8.8 million in illegal advanced fees in exchange for student loan debt relief services that did not exist. In its complaint,…
On August 17, 2023, the CFPB announced that it had taken enforcement action against a Florida-based mortgage lending and servicing corporation, as well as a New York-based real estate brokerage firm, issuing consent orders against the businesses for “exchanging things of value return for mortgage loan referrals”, in violation of Section 8(a)…
On July 26, 2023, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) issued a new Supervisory Highlights report (Report) that sheds light on the CFPB’s observations and findings of unfair, deceptive, and abusive practices in auto loan servicing, among other consumer financial products. The Report – which covers CFPB supervisory examinations from…
On August 2, 2023, the CFPB announced that it had filed a complaint against a Georgia-based auto-loan servicer alleging “unfair acts and practices in violation of the Consumer Financial Protection Act of 2010 (CFPA), 12 U.S.C. §§ 5531(a), 5536(a)(1).” The complaint, filed in United States District Court for the Northern District of Georgia,…
On July 17, 2023, Didier Reynders, Commissioner for Justice and Consumer Protection of the European Commission and Rohit Chopra, Director of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, announced the start of an “informal dialogue” between their two agencies. Reynders and Chopra indicated that the dialogue would cover a variety of important…
On July 26, 2023, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) released a Supervisory Highlights report covering findings from its examinations completed between July 2022 and March 2023 (the Report), which found, among other violations, several instances of unfair, deceptive, and abusive acts or practices related to auto lending, and illegal…
On July 19, 2023, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (“CFPB”) sued Snap Finance LLC, Snap R TO LLC, Snap Second Look LLC, Snap U.S. Holdings LLC, and Snap Finance Holdings LLC (collectively, the Snap Defendants or Snap). The complaint alleged that the Snap Defendants violated the: Consumer Financial Protection Act…
On July 13, 2023, the CFPB and various state attorneys general, along with California’s Department of Financial Protection and Innovation, filed an adversary proceeding against a sales training company for deceptive marketing and debt collection practices relating to the company’s allegedly illegal student loan program. The eight-count complaint, filed in the United States Bankruptcy Court…
On June 14, 2023, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) filed its opening brief in its appeal of a U.S. district court’s decision in the CFPB’s enforcement action against Townstone Mortgage (Townstone). The CFPB’s brief argues that the Seventh Circuit should reverse the district court’s holding that the Equal Credit…