The American Bankers Association and four other trade associations wrote to the chairs and ranking members of the House Financial Services and Senate Banking Committees this week raising concerns about the CFPB’s plans to gather data from automobile lenders about their lending portfolios and calling for lawmakers to exercise their oversight authority over the bureau. They noted that the bureau lacks the legal authority to make such a request and that the proposed data collection would be incredibly burdensome and encroach upon personal privacy of millions of Americans.
The CFPB is seeking approval from the Office of Management and Budget to collect annually extensive data from lenders; the collection mirrors orders issued last year to the nine largest auto lenders seeking 120 data points including loan terms and consumer complaints. The bureau also proposed to collect more limited data from lenders that originated between 500 and 20,000 loans in the previous calendar year.
“For this massive data collection, the CFPB has offered no justification other than an assertion that it needs the data to monitor the market for risks to consumers,” the associations wrote. “[T]he CFPB’s proposed information collection grossly exceeds its statutory authority and jeopardizes consumers’ privacy. In fact, several consumer groups are asking the CFPB to not only publish all the data collected, but also consider ways to collect data about consumer demographics, including race, ethnicity, age, gender, and other characteristics. The bureau’s proposal also completely fails to recognize and justify the immense paperwork burden on lenders and otherwise contravenes numerous congressionally mandated prerequisites of the Paperwork Reduction Act.”
