CFPB Fall 2019 Supervisory Report focuses on consumer reporting
On December 9, 2019, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB or bureau) issued its Fall 2019 Supervisory Highlights featuring supervisory observations from recent examinations. This is the second special edition focusing exclusively on furnishing information to consumer reporting companies (CRCs) as well as CRC’s general obligations under the Fair Credit Reporting Act (FCRA) and its implementing regulation, Regulation V (The term CRC, used throughout the report, is analogous to “consumer reporting agency” as defined in the FCRA). The CFPB released its first special edition in March 2017. As the new decade begins, these findings indicate trends regulators may continue to review in future exams, since furnishing was also included as an area of focus in the Summer 2019 Supervisory Highlights.
With respect to furnishing activities at institutions within the CFPB’s supervisory authority, including credit unions, the report details newly identified violations and compliance management errors with regard to policies and procedures, reporting information with actual knowledge of errors, the duty to correct and update information, the duty to provide notice of delinquencies to CRCs, and the obligation to respond to notices of disputes. Let’s briefly touch on each of these topics.
Reasonable, written policies and procedures. Under section 1022.42(a) of Regulation V, credit unions who furnish consumer information to CRCs “must establish and implement reasonable written policies and procedures regarding the accuracy and integrity of the information” provided. The policies and procedures need to be appropriate to the nature, size, complexity and scope of each furnisher’s activities. In reviewing mortgage reporting, the bureau found that one or more furnishers maintained general FCRA-related policies and procedures that did not provide sufficient guidance for responding to disputes in a timely manner or reporting changes when the status of furnished accounts changed.
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