On November 18, 2022, the CFPB published an article about how using CFPB complaint data can help cities and counties protect the public from unfair, deceptive, or abusive acts or practices. The Bureau has recently created the CFPB’s Government Portal where local, state, and federal government agencies can have access to more granular information about consumers’ complaints and companies’ responses through a secure interface.
According to the CFPB, the complaints it receives help inform its policy and regulatory priorities and enforcement activities which ensure a fair, transparent, and competitive financial marketplace. The agency aims to increase the impact of its complaint data by sharing it with cities and counties so they can also increase their efforts to protect consumers at the local level. In its initial engagement, the CFPB chose cities and counties that were best positioned to benefit from the complaint data, including:
Local governments with civil or criminal prosecutorial authority to monitor and enforce their own consumer protection laws as well as force-multiply enforcement of federal consumer financial protection laws such as those available under the Consumer Financial Protection Act; and
Local governments with, or that are working to create, financial empowerment offices and developing financial empowerment strategies to improve financial stability for low- and moderate-income households.
The CFPB has already begun onboarding the selected local governments to the CFPB’s Government Portal, which enables them to:
See in real-time what consumers are experiencing in the financial marketplace and how companies are responding;
Download complaints to investigate and enforce rules protecting consumers;
Compare problems their constituents are facing to other localities and nationwide;
Filter and export information to ensure targeted analysis by time period, company, geography, etc;
Securely refer individual complaints to the CFPB; and
Receive the list of companies responding to complaints through CFPB’s process.
Read the CFPB’s article here.