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Financial Services Law Insights and Observations

CFPB to amend Remittance Transfer Rule

Agency Rule-Making & Guidance CFPB Remittance Transfer Rule EFTA Regulation E Remittance

Agency Rule-Making & Guidance

On December 3, the CFPB issued a Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (NPRM) relating to the Remittance Transfer Rule (Rule), which implements the Electronic Fund Transfer Act’s (EFTA) protections for consumers sending international money transfers, or remittance transfers. The NPRM makes three proposals. First, the Bureau proposes to increase the Rule’s safe harbor threshold, mitigating compliance costs for financial institutions. The EFTA and the Rule consider a “remittance transfer provider” to include “any person that provides remittance transfers for a customer in the normal course of business.” However, the Rule currently includes a “safe harbor” provision that excludes persons that process 100 or fewer remittance transfers annually. The NPRM proposes increasing this threshold from 100 to 500 international remittance transfers per year. According to the Bureau’s announcement, the change would “reduce the burden on over 400 banks and almost 250 credit unions that send a relatively small number of remittances—less than .06 percent of all remittances.”

Second, the NPRM proposes adopting two permanent exceptions. The first is a permanent statutory exception that would allow certain insured institutions to estimate exchange rates and money transfer fees they are required to disclose, rather than provide consumers with exact costs when they send money abroad. Such an exemption would only apply in instances where a remittance payment is made in the local currency of the designated recipient’s country and the insured institution processing the transaction made 1,000 or fewer remittance payments to that country in the previous calendar year. An identical exemption provision is currently set to expire July 21, 2020. (Previous InfoBytes coverage here.) The NPRM proposes adopting a second permanent exception to allow insured institutions to estimate covered third-party fees for remittance transfers to a recipient’s institution provided, among other things, the insured institution made 500 or fewer remittance transfers to the recipient’s institution the prior calendar year.

Third, the NPRM requests comments on a list of safe harbor countries for which providers may use estimates for remittance transfers.

Comments must be received 45 days after publication in the Federal Register. In conjunction with the NPRM, the Bureau also released a summary of the NPRM, a table of contents, and an unofficial redline of the proposed amendments to the Rule.