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A report issued Tuesday by CardHub.com says that the Fed set an "embarrassingly low bar" for issuer disclosures.
November 27 -
Under the proposal, card issuers could consider shared household income when approving credit card applications.
October 17 -
In a rare coordinated effort Monday, all three federal banking agencies, the CFPB and the state regulator in Utah announced more than $112 million in enforcement penalties against American Express for card practices that allegedly violated a range of consumer protection laws.
October 1
WASHINGTON — The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau said Wednesday that it is looking for input on credit card rules to make more informed policy decisions.
The agency said it is specifically seeking comments on how the Credit Card Accountability Responsibility and Disclosure Act of 2009 has impacted consumers and the card industry, including changes to terms and conditions; cost and availability of credit; account repricing; and whether unfair or deceptive practices still exist.
"With today's inquiry, the bureau is seeking to understand how the credit card market is working in practice and how the CARD Act changes have affected consumers and credit card issuers," CFPB Director Richard Cordray said in a press release.
The agency said the comment period, which is open for 60 days, will be used to help make future policy decisions on the credit card industry.
The CFPB is required to periodically report results of the CARD Act to Congress and the public. But this time, the report comes just after another report was released in late November by CardHub.com that criticized the Federal Reserve Board for its lack of standards on credit card issuers when disclosing interest rate changes. The report did, however, praise the CFPB's card disclosure prototype, which is part of the bureau's "know-before-you-owe" initiative.
The CFPB first held a conference in February 2011 to review the CARD Act. Those findings revealed that the new laws had "largely curtailed" sudden interest rate hikes, reduced late fees and nearly ended over-limit fees on consumers.
Since then, the bureau has ramped up its card rule proposals as well as enforcement of card issuers. In October, the CFPB proposed allowing a stay-at-home parent to rely on their spouse's income when qualifying for a credit card. The comment period for that proposal closes Jan. 7.
