Welcome to the “Student Lending” chapter of our annual report, Consumer Financial Services: 2024 Year in Review. Regulators will likely continue to focus on junk fees and purported deceptive or nontransparent practices...more
On February 14, the Governor of New York signed into law AB 431 (the “Act”), amending Article 9, Sections 901, 902 and 904 of the financial services law relating to private education debt reporting. The Act requires student...more
CFPB examiners have identified a variety of illegal practices across student loan markets, the bureau said, in a special edition [add the link here] of its Supervisory Highlights. The report covers alleged violations related...more
On December 16, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB or Bureau) released a special edition of its Supervisory Highlights, detailing a range of activities identified by CFPB examiners across the student loan...more
On July 2, the CFPB released its Summer 2024 Supervisory Highlights, which focused on the servicing and collection of consumer debt. The report shared key findings from recent supervisory examinations of auto and student loan...more
On May 31, the CFPB announced its lawsuit against a Pennsylvania-based student loan servicer (the defendant) for allegedly collecting on discharged loans. According to the complaint, the defendant lacked policies and...more
In this article, we share a timeline of our monthly "bites" for 2023 applicable to debt collection. If debt collection in 2023 had a theme it would be medical debt....more
In this month's article, we share some of our top "bites" for the prior and current month covered during the January 2024 webinar....more
On November 20, 2023, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (“CFPB”) announced that it had partnered with the 11 States of California, Delaware, Illinois, Massachusetts, Minnesota, North Carolina, Oregon, South Carolina,...more
In a recently published opinion by Fourth Circuit Judge Quattlebaum, Jr., the majority of the panel found there to be a genuine dispute of material fact in Plaintiff Mark Anthony Guthrie’s North Carolina Debt Collection Act...more
The New York state legislature is currently considering a pair of companion bills which would impose detailed notice and records requirements upon student loan servicers. New York Senate bill S5136B, which was passed by the...more
On May 2, 2022, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB or Bureau) published its spring 2022 Supervisory Highlights report. As discussed in more detail below, the report addresses observations made in examinations...more
On Mach 13, 2020, near the beginning of the pandemic in the U.S., the CARES Act included a pause for all federal student loans. Nearly 90 percent of student borrowers accepted “the option of pressing the pause button on...more
[co-authors: Amelie Hopkins, and Collin Grier] The year 2021 started with the hope of COVID-19 vaccines and a return to (relative) normalcy, only to conclude with new variants that presented new challenges and extended...more
Last month, the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals rendered a decision regarding convenience fees in Alexander v. Carrington Mortgage Services, LLC, 23 F.4th 370 (4th Cir. 2022), which potentially spells trouble for loan...more
In last month's issue of Insights we discussed a new licensing regime in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts specific to student loan servicers. As of the publication date of that article the rules such servicers must follow...more
On April 21, 2021, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit issued a decision that threatens significant consequences for a variety of loan servicing and debt collection industries. The upshot of the court’s holding...more
The CFPB has issued “Supervisory Highlights COVID-19 Prioritized Assessments Special Edition.” The report indicates that in May 2020, the Bureau rescheduled about half of its planned examinations and instead conducted...more
Consumer Law Hinsights is a monthly compilation of nationwide consumer protection cases of interest to financial services and accounts receivable management companies. This edition also highlights the recently updated 50...more
A&B ABstract: In a number of recent decisions, district courts have split on the issue of whether a mortgage servicer violates the Fair Debt Collection Practices Act (“FDCPA”) and related state debt collection statutes by...more
Real Property Update - Affirmative Defense / Waiver: Homeowner unable to raise statute of limitations affirmative defense for the first time in motion for summary judgment – Deer Brooke S. Homeowners Ass’n of Polk Cty.,...more
The CFPB has released the Winter 2020 edition of its Supervisory Highlights. The report discusses the Bureau’s examinations findings in the areas of debt collection, mortgage servicing, payday lending, and student loan...more
As Enforcement Watch reported in late September, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (“CFPB”) announced that it had filed a proposed consent judgment in the United States District Court for Delaware to resolve claims...more
On April 18, 2017, the Supreme Court of the United States heard oral argument on the issue of whether the Fair Debt Collection Practices Act ("FDCPA") extends beyond traditional "debt collectors" to those entities that...more
On April 18, 2017, the United States Supreme Court, once again with nine justices sitting on the bench, heard oral arguments in Henson v. Santander Consumer USA, Inc., No. 16-349, concerning the scope of the Federal Debt...more