“We write to express our grave concerns over [Equifax’s] slow response to the
breach and then its shifting, maddening, and ultimately inadequate response to consumers including
our members, clients and other constituencies. We write with several recommendations for what
Congress should and should not do in response.”
The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau’s review of unfair and abusive overdraft practices is complemented by its recent efforts to limit the use of forced arbitration, said five consumer groups in a joint letter sent today to Director Richard Cordray. U.S. Senate leadership is pushing for a vote this week on a Congressional Review Act (CRA) resolution to repeal a CFPB rule that restores consumers’ right to join together in court against banks and lenders.
“[E]xecutives for both Wells Fargo and Equifax… will testify in Senate committees next week. Both companies have used arbitration clauses in an attempt to deny consumers access to the courts… ‘This rush toward a vote in the Senate is a cynical attempt to roll back an important consumer protection before anyone gets straight answers from Equifax and Wells Fargo about the damage they’ve done to the financial lives of millions of Americans,’ said Lisa Donner, executive director of Americans for Financial Reform.”
This rush toward a vote in the Senate is a cynical attempt to roll back an important consumer protection before anyone gets straight answers from Equifax and Wells Fargo about the damage they’ve done to the financial lives of millions of Americans.
“The vote [came] during the debate over the Financial Services and General Government bill, which funds some basic functions of the federal government, including the Treasury Department… Rep. Keith Ellison (D-Minn.) introduced an amendment to take this language out of the appropriations bill and continue to allow the CFPB to regulate payday lenders as it regulates all financial services businesses. The amendment failed with four Republicans joining Ellison to protect borrowers and three Democrats choosing to side with payday predators.”
We call on the Bureau: to require reporting on the full breadth of small business lending; to capture important data about loans applied for and made; and to complete the rulemaking and begin collection of these data expeditiously.
“The regulation, issued by the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau on July 10 and scheduled to go into effect in mid-January, came under attack by Republicans in Congress ‘before the ink was even dry,’ says Amanda Werner of Americans for Financial Reform, which is fighting to retain the rule… Consumer privacy advocates hope that the Equifax debacle will remind senators of the importance of the rule. ‘We need to look at how consumers are going to be able to hold these firms accountable,’ Werner says.”
Congress should preserve CFPB’s rule curbing forced arbitration and abandon attempts to lighten regulation of credit bureaus in the wake of massive data breach at Equifax.
The Department of Education’s decision to end information sharing with the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) is a betrayal of students and a boon to loan servicers with a history of preying on those students.
“The payday rule is seen as one of the last major Cordray-era regulatory proposals that haven’t been finalized, and consumer advocacy groups and liberal Democrats who support the CFPB have also been supportive of the rule proposal as a key measure to prevent consumers from getting mired in debt. Jose Alcoff, campaign organizer at Americans for Financial Reform, defended the bureau’s approach to the payday loans issue. ‘It’s been 29 months since the proposal was first outlined, and 15 since it was formally put to the public… We do need a rule soon to curb these abuses.’”