Prepaid account issuers can begin registering now on the consumer financial protection agency’s “streamlined” submission system as they prepare to submit their prepaid agreements to the agency under a rule set to take effect April 1, the regulator announced Wednesday.
Under the prepaid rule of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB), prepaid account issuers are required to submit their prepaid account agreements, including fee information. The first submissions, to be made via the bureau’s “Collect” system, are due May 1. After that, issuers will be required to make a submission to the bureau within 30 days whenever a new agreement is offered, a previously submitted agreement is amended, or a previously submitted agreement is no longer offered.
The bureau also Wednesday announced the release of compliance materials for prepaid issuers, including a user guide, a quick reference guide, FAQs, and a recorded webinar.
The CFPB’s prepaid rule was adopted in 2016 and revised in January 2018. The 2016 final rule set requirements for treatment of funds on lost or stolen cards, error resolution and investigation, upfront fee disclosures, access to account information, and overdraft features if offered in conjunction with prepaid accounts. The 2018 revisions adjusted the requirements for resolving errors on unregistered accounts, provided greater flexibility for credit cards linked to digital wallets, and extended the effective date of the rule by one year to this April.
Register for Collect (“Collect” is CFPB’s submission system)
Prepaid rule compliance aids