On January 28, 2021, the California Department of Financial Protection & Innovation (DFPI) announced that it entered into five Memorandums of Understanding (MOUs) with five different earned wage access companies. Earned wage access companies provide consumers with advances or “on-demand pay” before their pay day for wages that they have earned but not yet received. According to…
On January 19, 2020, the California Department of Financial Protection and Innovation (DFPI) launched an investigation into a dozen debt collectors potentially engaging in unlawful, unfair, deceptive, or abusive acts or practices (UDAAP) under California law. This represents the first major public action taken under the expanded oversight and enforcement authority of the California…
On January 26, 2021, a California federal judge granted the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau’s (CFPB) motion for default judgment against a now-defunct financial aid services company. The court also granted in part the CFPB’s motion for summary judgment against the company’s founder. The ruling resolves a complaint filed by the CFPB in 2015, previously covered by…
On January 19, 2021, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) issued a new final rule implementing the Fair Debt Collection Practices Act (FDCPA). According the CFPB’s press release, the purpose of the new final rule is to “clarif[y] the differences between regulations and supervisory guidance.” Specifically, “supervisory guidance does not…
Enforcement Watch and Goodwin’s Consumer Financial Services Enforcement Team are excited to announce the arrival of Alli Schoenthal to our team! Alli will reside in our New York office. Alli represents banks, trusts, lenders, government-sponsored enterprises, private equity firms, and loan servicers in consumer finance litigation and enforcement matters. Her practice…
LenderLaw Watch and Goodwin’s Consumer Financial Services Litigation Team are excited to announce the arrival of Alli Schoenthal to our team! Alli will reside in our New York office. Alli represents banks, trusts, lenders, government-sponsored enterprises, private equity firms, and loan servicers in consumer finance litigation and enforcement matters. Her…
On January 15, 2021, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) announced it had filed suit in the United States District Court for the District of Connecticut against a Connecticut-based mortgage company and three individual defendants for alleged violations of the Truth in Lending Act (TILA), the Fair Credit Reporting Act (FCRA), the Equal Credit Opportunity Act…
On January 5, 2021, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) Taskforce on Federal Consumer Financial Law (Taskforce) issued a final report (Report) with recommendations on how to improve consumer protection in the financial marketplace. In proposing changes to the existing legal and regulatory framework, the Report is centered around five…
On January 14, 2021, Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison (Minnesota AG) announced that his office reached a settlement with a California-based student loan debt-relief company that allegedly collected unlawful fees from customers and made misrepresentations to them regarding its ability to forgive student loans. According to the Minnesota AG, the company allegedly made false promises to…
As LenderLaw Watch previously reported, the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC) issued its final rule on the True Lender doctrine in October 2020, addressing ambiguity in federal law and establishing that a national bank is the “true lender” of a loan when, as of the date of…
On December 10, 2020, the Federal Trade Commission (Commission) announced that it reached a settlement with a payment processor and its former CEO for alleged violations of the Federal Trade Commission Act (FTCA). The complaint alleges that the payment processor illegally processed more than $93 million in consumer credit card charges related to fraudulent…
On December 30, 2020, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) announced that it had entered into a consent order with a lender that provided installment loans to consumers affiliated with the military over the lender’s alleged violations of the Military Lending Act (MLA), Electronic Fund Transfer Act (EFTA), and Consumer…
On December 8, 2020, the United States Supreme Court held oral argument in the case of Facebook, Inc. v. Duguid, No. 19-511, concerning the circuit split over what type of equipment qualifies as an “automatic telephone dialing system” (ATDS) within the statutory definition of that term set forth in Telephone…