CFPB Interagency Agreement Increases Oversight Of Colleges Serving Veterans

CFPB FTC Department of Veterans Affairs

Recently, the CFPB signed a memorandum of understanding with the Departments of Veterans Affairs, Defense and Education to improve outreach and transparency to veterans and servicemembers by providing meaningful information to help them make informed decisions when selecting an institution of higher learning, including access to financial cost and performance outcome information. These improvements for military educational benefit recipients are designed to prevent deceptive recruiting practices and ensure that educational institutions provide high-quality academic and support services to veterans and servicemembers. Specifically, the agreement requires the CFPB to (i) designate the Assistant Director for Servicemember Affairs, Holly Petraeus, as the point of contact for information sharing processes among the Departments of Veterans Affairs, Defense and Education; (ii) alert agencies to patterns of noncompliance; and (iii) provide complaint data to the FTC. On August 26, the CFPB issued a press release describing this agreement as a means to better protect veterans, servicemembers, and their family members attending college by carrying out “a comprehensive strategy to strengthen enforcement and compliance work.” The agreement is effective July 18, 2014.