insideARM Weekly Recap- Week of April 22nd, 2024

The insideARM team aims to bring you only the information ARM industry professionals need to know each week in order to stay up to date in the volatile world of debt collection. The most important news from last week involved emails and the FDCPA, the CFPB’s continued attempts to expand the scope of its supervision, and the NCLC’s influence on legislation. Continue reading for a summary of these articles and why we published them for you.

On Tuesday, we wanted to focus on the ongoing issue of sending emails and complying with the FDCPA by sharing a piece by John Rossman. The article tackled the current problem of email delays and subsequent class action lawsuits brought by consumer attorneys. Consumer attorneys are pushing the boundaries of the FDCPA by claiming that emails are being sent by collectors at inopportune times. The emails are being sent at allowed times but arrive too late or too early due to delays by email carriers. The piece also details how to identify these delays and, ultimately, defeat class action certification.

We highlighted an article by Troutman Pepper on Wednesday concerning the most recent move by the CFPB regarding its supervision of nonbank entities. This procedural rule looks to entice nonbanks to consent to supervision by the CFPB while also streamlining their process regarding timelines, decision-making, and notice provisions. This rule amends and enhances procedures from 2013 and is a continuation of recent CFPB actions regarding their supervisory role. The CFPB announced in 2022 that they would be more active using this authority, began doing so in 2023 and 2024, and we do not anticipate them to stop there.

Thursday, we wanted to inform you about a recent document that the NCLC has published. The State Policy Resource is a consumer-friendly debt collection document that provides consumers, consumer attorneys, and legislators with studies, articles, and model legislation to influence the discourse and rulemaking in the debt collection world. While protecting consumers is an important goal and one we believe should be part of the conversation regarding debt collection, this resource is problematic due to its extreme bias, harmful rhetoric regarding debt collectors, and consumer-centric model legislation, which fails to consider the harmful consequences it will cause to consumers and the economy. The ARM industry needs to continue to pay attention to NCLC initiatives and keep an eye on as important debt collection rules and regulations are being debated around the country.

We at insideARM thank you for reading our weekly recap. If you missed the recap from the week of April 15th, you can find it here.

To discuss these topics or get advice about your own collection or compliance issues, click here to learn more about Research Assistant, our weekly peer group meeting, and our library of resources!