Finally! The annual privacy notice exception goes final

If a comet or other projectile were to destroy the planet Saturn, it would take 767 days for gravity to pull its remains into the sun.

Coincidentally, that is also how long it took the Bureau to finalize the rule implementing the annual privacy notice exception.

While the wait might have been astronomical in duration, the substance of the amendment to Regulation P is, thankfully, not. In December 2015, Congress passed the Fixing America’s Surface Transportation Act (the FAST Act), section 75001 of which contained an amendment to the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act (GLBA)’s Financial Privacy Rule. Specifically, it added paragraph 503(f) (codified at 15 U.S.C. 6803(f)) creating an exception to the requirement to send an annual privacy notice where certain requirements were met.

The Bureau’s proposed rule stayed pretty close to the text of the statute, but added some timing requirements for starting annual notices when credit unions fall out of the exception. It also asked for feedback about what to do with the alternative delivery method. NAFCU commented on the proposal in August 2016. While it took the Bureau quite a bit of time to push the final rule out, this hasn’t necessarily been an issue as both the Bureau and NCUA had indicated that they were treating the FAST Act amendment as being effective, regardless of the state of the implementing regulation. So the exception has been available for credit unions since December 2015.

 

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