The CFPB highlighted findings from supervisory examinations completed between January 2021 and June 2021. The examinations covered, among other things, (i) credit card account management, (ii) debt collection, (iii) deposits, (iv) fair lending, (v) mortgage servicing and (vi) payday lending.

In its periodic publication Supervisory Highlights, the CFPB reported, among other things, examples of:

• violations of Regulation Z ("Truth in Lending Act") in relation to credit card account management operations, specifically, that certain creditors had (i) failed to resolve a dispute within two business cycles after receiving notice regarding the failure to credit a payment that the consumer made, (ii) failed to reimburse a consumer for a late fee after the creditor determined a missing payment had not been credited to the consumer's account, as the consumer asserted, and (iii) failed to conduct a reasonable investigation after receiving notice of a billing error related to missing payments and unauthorized transactions;

• deceptive acts or practices prohibited by the Consumer Financial Protection Act of 2010, because certain creditors engaged in deceptive marketing of credit card bonus offers;

• violations of the Fair Debt Collection Practices Act in relation to the use of false representations or deceptive means to collect a debt;

• violations of Regulation E ("Electronic Fund Transfers") in relation to deposits, specifically, that certain institutions had (i) failed to determine that token errors, i.e., misdirected transfers, constituted incorrect electronic fund transfers and (ii) failed to conduct reasonable investigations when the institutions received notice from consumers that the consumers had sent funds, but the intended recipient had not received them;

• violations of the Equal Credit Opportunity Act and Regulation B in relation to fair lending, specifically, that certain creditors (i) discriminated against borrowers on the basis of race or sex in granting pricing exceptions based on competitive offers, and (ii) discriminated against borrowers on the basis of religion by inquiring into the borrower's religion and considering that information in the credit decision;

• unfair and deceptive acts or practices in relation to mortgage servicing, specifically, that certain mortgage servicers (i) charged prohibited late and default-related fees to borrowers in Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security Act forbearances, (ii) failed to terminate preauthorized electronic fund transfers, (iii) overcharged consumers for certain services rendered and (iv) provided inaccurate information in borrowers' online mortgage loan accounts;

• violations of Regulation X ("Real Estate Settlement Procedures Act") in relation to mortgage servicing, because certain mortgage servicers failed to evaluate complete loss mitigation applications within 30 days, and violations of Regulation Z because certain mortgage providers applied payments in excess of the amount due to borrowers' escrow accounts; and

• unfair and deceptive acts or practices in relation to payday lending, specifically, that certain lenders (i) engaged in erroneous debiting of loan balances from consumers' accounts and (ii) attempted additional, unauthorized debits on consumer accounts mainly due to errors in the lenders' systems.

Primary Sources

1. Supervisory Highlights, Issue 25, Fall 2021

2. Federal Register: Supervisory Highlights, Issue 25, Fall 2021