Are Your Sales Agents or ISOs Up to Snuff? (Take Our Research Survey)
August 12, 2015If you enjoy reading AltFinanceDaily’s articles, please take the time to take our short survey:
Some background:
What started as a few sensational articles about practices in small business lending and merchant cash advance is now turning into a cry for a governmental crackdown by not only observers outside the industry but lenders from inside the industry itself.
Stories that look like they’ve been written by consumer activist groups are being penned by your peers. Just recently, Fundera’s Brayden McCarthy submitted his thoughts to American Banker and the Huffington Post.
“As evidence,” he wrote. “One need only look to some lenders’ triple-digit interest rates, the proliferation of shady loan brokers and inadequate or nonexistent disclosure of price and terms. Some practices, such as brokers that brand themselves as impartial but take incentives to market certain lenders over others, resemble behavior seen in the run-up to the financial crisis.”
Along with the Treasury’s RFI, there is a mass lobbying effort to regulate the industry as fast possible. As Patrick Siegfried, Esq pointed out recently, former SBA Administrator Karen Mills recently urged the the CFPB to implement the Small Business Data Collection Rule of the Dodd-Frank Act, a law which could potentially outlaw the underwriting practices of the entire business lending and merchant cash advance industries.
There’s also been the publication of a Small Business Borrowers’ Bill of Rights and the formation of the Responsible Business Lending Coalition. And on Forbes, an interview with loan broker Ami Kassar described the industry as the wild, wild west.
As a long time participant and observer in the industry, (this is my 10th year now) I want nothing more than a bright and prosperous future for both my peers and America’s small businesses. I hope you’ll take two minutes to take our survey above.
Thanks!
15,000 exempt from the debit card interchange fee standards
August 23, 2011Originally Published on July 14, 2011.
Why is the number ‘15,000’ significant? That’s approximately the number of banks that are EXEMPT from the debit fee interchange cap. Download List
From the Federal Reserve:
The Federal Reserve Board on Tuesday published lists of institutions that are subject to, and exempt from, the debit card interchange fee standards in Regulation II, which implements provisions of the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act. These lists, available at http://www.federalreserve.gov/paymentsystems/debitfees.htm, are intended to help payment card networks and others determine which issuers qualify for the statutory exemption from interchange fee standards. The statute exempts any debit card issuer that, together with its affiliates, has assets of less than $10 billion.
To facilitate compliance with the debit card interchange fee standards in the Board’s Regulation II, 12 CFR part 235 (which implements section 920 of the Electronic Fund Transfer Act), the Board is publishing two lists of institutions using data available to the Board. These lists are intended to help payment card networks and others determine which issuers qualify for the statutory exemption from interchange fee standards.1 The statute exempts any debit card issuer that, together with its affiliates, has assets of less than $10 billion. The lists have been generated from the set of institutions in existence on December 31, 2010, according to the available data.2 Institutions have been grouped into two categories: Exempt and Not Exempt. Institutions in the Exempt category have been determined to have, together with their affiliates, reported assets of less than $10 billion, and therefore are exempt from the interchange fee standards under the statute. Institutions in the Not Exempt category have been determined to have, either individually or together with their affiliates, reported assets of $10 billion or more, and therefore are not exempt from the interchange fee standards under the statute.
In addition, a small number of debit card issuers may not appear on either of these lists, such as institutions for which the Board has incomplete affiliate data, de novo institutions for which the Board did not have financial data as of December 31, 2010, and issuers without federal deposit insurance. If an issuer does not appear on either of these lists and is exempt from the interchange fee standards, it should so certify to its participating payment card networks.
The interchange fee standards become effective on October 1, 2011. The Board plans to update the lists annually.
For media inquiries, call 202-452-2955.
Read the report and find the list here:
http://www.federalreserve.gov/newsevents/press/bcreg/20110712a.htm
