DCS2019 Session: Where Technology Meets Collections

No, it’s not all about an Alien species.  DCS2019 highlights some of the best educational sessions available.  On Thursday, September 12^th, hear from technology and operational experts on topics such as: Understanding the role of AI and machine learning in your organization, Key elements in implementing AI in the collection process, key risks with technology, leveraging new technologies, innovations in identity intelligence, optimizing right party contacts and decreasing operational costs!  Joining our panel to start are: Dan Fox, SmartAction, Abhishek Goel, Dasceq, Matthew Wolk, Neustar, Gregory Allen, Pairity and more to be announced!  Mark your calendars and don’t miss this special session at Debt Connection Symposium & Expo, to be held September 10^th – 12^th at the Red Rock in Las Vegas.  Still time to register at the Early Bird Pricing, check it out at https://debtconnectionsymposium.com/

BankThink The case for market-based CRA reform

The Community Reinvestment Act was enacted in 1977 to hold banks accountable for “meeting the credit needs” of their local communities in a safe and sound manner. Yet if the CRA was not in place today, would stakeholders want to enact it? Many people may be inclined to answer affirmatively simply based on the CRA’s statutory goal. Furthermore, when it became law, many low-income and minority communities found mortgage and small-business lending hard to come by. At the time, the CRA sought to address persistent and institutionalized credit discrimination going back to the 1930s, when the government-sponsored Home Owners’ Loan Corporation discouraged banks from providing credit to “hazardous” areas, colored red on HOLC-issued maps. Such “redlining” prevailed for decades.

Teachers union sues Betsy DeVos over loan forgiveness program

JPMorgan Chase credit card customers have a month to opt out of binding arbitration

JPMorgan Chase is trying to make it harder for its credit card customers to sue the bank in court by requiring them to go into private arbitration to settle disputes.   The opportunity for JPMorgan Chase credit cardholders to opt out of binding arbitration expires in a month.  The bank notified customers in May that their right to sue over grievances connected to their Chase credit cards will go away unless they take some action by the first week in August.

IRS Staffs Up As a Result of Disputed Private Debt Collection Program

In its latest congressionally-mandated report on contracting out collection of recalcitrant tax debts, the Internal Revenue Service said it is hiring 100 specialist staffers this fall and plans to bring on another 100 in a year The revival of an earlier program required by Congress in 2015 contracts with four private companies which, under specified rules, go after delinquent taxpayers the IRS has been unable to collect from. Critics—including the just-departed National Taxpayer Advocate Nina Olson—blast the public-private partnership for superseding an IRS core function and for deploying company bill collectors who are not always sensitive to the challenges of low-income taxpayers.

Trump blasts Bitcoin, Facebook’s Libra, demands they face banking regulations

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. President Donald Trump on Thursday criticized Bitcoin, Facebook’s proposed Libra digital coin and other cryptocurrencies and demanded that companies seek a banking charter and make themselves subject to U.S. and global regulations if they wanted to “become a bank.”

How Nevada Plans to Solve the Marijuana Banking Problem

Nevada hopes to be the first state to create its own banking system for the booming marijuana industry, which has generated more than $150 million in tax revenue since 2017, according to Nevada Treasurer Zach Conine’s office. Since the drug is still illegal under federal law, most banks won’t accept cannabis businesses as clients. As a result, the multimillion-dollar industry is mainly a cash business -- at least for now

6th Cir. Rejects FCRA ‘Credit File Disclosure’ Claim for Lack of Spokeo Standing

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit recently held that a plaintiff lacked Article III standing to sue a consumer reporting agency under the federal Fair Credit Reporting Act (FCRA) for allegedly failing to disclose all information in his file.

Good News In Bad Reyes: Southern District of Florida Stays Case Pending FCC Rulemaking

Everyone in TCPAWorld is familiar with the two Reyes cases. In Good Reyes, the Second Circuit held that contractual consent cannot be revoked unilaterally. Which makes sense, because contracts are binding, and you can’t back out of contractual promises at will. But in Bad Reyes, the Southern District of Florida became one of the first courts to hold that the FCC’s 2003 and 2008 ATDS orders survived ACA International. See Reyes v. BCA Fin. Servs., Inc., 2018 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 80690 (S.D. Fla. May 14, 2018). So the name “Reyes” took on a whole new meaning in TCPAWorld.

Broken Promises: Teachers Sue U.S. Over Student Loans That Weren’t Forgiven

Debbie Baker thought she qualified for a federal program that helps teachers such as her, as well as nurses, police officers, librarians and others. The Department of Education program forgives their federal student loans if they make their payments for 10 years and work in public service. For 10 years, Baker, who was a public school teacher in Tulsa, Okla., checked in with loan servicing companies and was told she was on track. "I said, 'I'm qualifying for public service loan forgiveness,' and they said, 'OK, great,' " she says.

FTC Stops Student Loan Debt Relief Scheme, Charges Operators with Misleading Consumers

The Federal Trade Commission has stopped a student loan debt relief scheme, alleging it bilked more than $23 million from thousands of consumers with false claims that it would service and pay down their student loans. After the FTC filed a complaint seeking to end the deceptive practices, a federal court temporarily halted the scheme and froze its assets.

THE AUDIT BENCHMARKING OVERSIGHT SURVEY FOR CREDITORS AND SERVICERS ENDS JULY 15!

We’ve kept these short, but meaningful.  All responses are confidential, and can be anonymous.  All participants can receive a copy of the results by providing their contact information to us.  No individual company information or contact information will be provided in the analysis and results.

Audit oversight survey for creditors
To participate in the Creditor Audit Oversight Survey, please use the link below https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/2019CreditSurvey

Audit oversight survey for agencies, attorneys and specialty vendors
To participate in the Agency Audit Oversight Survey, please use the link below: https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/2019ServicerSurvey

You still have time to participate in the Audit Benchmarking Oversight Survey for Creditors and Servicers, which ends July 15.

Consumer Financial Protection Bureau Settles Lawsuit Against Freedom Debt Relief

WASHINGTON, D.C. — The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (Bureau) today settled its lawsuit against Freedom Debt Relief, LLC, the nation’s largest debt-settlement services provider. The company agreed to pay $20 million in restitution to affected consumers and a $5 million civil money penalty.

CoreLogic Reports Lowest Overall Delinquency Rate in More Than 20 Years this April

CoreLogic^® (CLGX), a leading global property information, analytics and data-enabled solutions provider, today released its monthly Loan Performance Insights Report. The report shows that nationally 3.6% of mortgages were in some stage of delinquency (30 days or more past due, including those in foreclosure) in April 2019, representing a 0.7 percentage point decline in the overall delinquency rate compared with April 2018, when it was 4.3%. This was the lowest rate for any month in more than 20 years.

Synthetic Identity Fraud in the U.S. Payment System

The U.S. payment system faces dynamic, persistent and rapidly escalating threats as technological developments in  cybercrime make it easier than ever to commit payments fraud.  Since 2015,  the Federal Reserve has collaborated with a wide array of industry stakeholders to advance U.S. payments security.  This is consistent with the approaches described in our paper,  Strategies for Improving the U.S. Payment System:  Federal Reserve Next Steps in the Payments  Improvement Journey.

New banks of 2019

De novo activity is strong for the second year in a row. The Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. approved applications for 14 new banks in 2018. Eight banks have opened this year, including Piermont Bank and Trustar Bank in recent days, and seven other organizing groups have submitted paperwork. Regulators, including FDIC Chairman Jelena McWilliams, have sounded more receptive to new-bank formation. “I do not profess to know what the right number of banks in the U.S. is, but I recognize that, like many competitive industries, a dynamic banking sector needs new startups entering the marketplace,” McWilliams recently wrote in a BankThink opinion piece with American Banker.

Massachusetts legislators take steps to protect student borrowers

A bill before the Massachusetts Legislature, if approved, would create a Student Loan Bill of Rights that includes appointing a state student loan ombudsman in the state Attorney General’s office. Five states so far this year have passed new laws aimed at protecting student loan borrowers. Another three are steps away from doing so and similar bills filed in a handful of others, including Massachusetts, according to a new report.

CFPB 2019 fair lending report highlights alternative scoring models

The CFPB’s annual fair lending report covering its 2018 activities was published in today’s Federal Register. While most of the report recycles information about which we have previously blogged, it does contain the following noteworthy information: In September 2018, the CFPB held a symposium to address the issue of access to credit for consumers who are “credit invisible” – that is, those without an established credit history with the three national credit reporting agencies – and who therefore cannot be scored by most traditional credit scoring models.

Utah launching ‘sandbox’ program for fintech innovators

SALT LAKE CITY — The Beehive State is launching an effort to spark innovation in the financial technology space.   The Utah Department of Commerce Tuesday announced the start of the nation’s second regulatory sandbox based on legislation passed by Utah lawmakers. HB378 permits financial technology companies to apply for a special exemption when setting up a business. According to a news release, Utah’s program allows participants to temporarily test new financial services or products on a limited basis without otherwise being licensed or authorized to act under Utah law.

Consumer bankers urge lawmakers to pass plain-language loan disclosures

The Consumer Bankers Association (CBA) is urging lawmakers to support the Student Loan Disclosure Modernization Act, which would require federal student loans to carry plain-language disclosures on the true cost of the loan. In a letter to the bill’s sponsors, Sens. Tim Scott (R-SC) and Joe Manchin (D-WV), CBA officials point out that private student loans offered by banks already have these disclosures. These disclosures on private loans contribute to a 98 percent repayment rate of private student loans.

Big banks view consumer trust as an advantage over challengers

As waves of fintech startups rise up to challenge legacy banks, incumbents are finding their high levels of consumer trust to be a chief advantage, CNBC reports. "Customers trust legacy banks to keep their money safe, but they're slightly unsure of fintechs keeping their money safe," Amelia Nicholls, chief of staff at RBS' digital standalone bank Bo told CNBC.

FTC Returns More than $380,000 to Victims of Business Coaching and Development Services Scam

The Federal Trade Commission is mailing 1,177 checks totaling more than $380,000 to people who paid for purported business coaching services that were marketed as a way to help them earn thousands of dollars a month. The refunds stem from an FTC settlement in which the Commission alleged that the defendants bought contact information for people who were interested in starting an online business and marketed aggressively to them. According to the FTC’s complaint, the defendants promised consumers that they could make thousands of dollars a month online if they bought business coaching and related services, which often cost over $10,000. Most people who bought the defendants’ services did not develop a functioning business, earned little or no money, and often ended up in debt, according to the complaint.

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NACTT 54th Annual Seminar Registration Open

NACTT

ACA International 2019 Annual Convention & Expo

ACA International

Debt Connection Symposium & Expo 2019

Resource Management Services, Inc.

National Creditors Bar Association 2019 Fall Conference

National Creditors Bar Association