ABA Files Amicus Brief on Mortgage Servicing Convenience Fees
Amy Thomas-Lawson; Brenda Boley; Miguel Padilla; William Green; on behalf of themselves and all those similarly situated, Plaintiffs-Appellants, v. Carrington Mortgage Services, LLC, Defendant-Appellee. On Appeal from the United States District Court for the Central District of California
Pursuant to Federal Rule of Appellate Procedure 26.1(a), amici curiae Mortgage Bankers Association, American Bankers Association, National Association of Federally-Insured Credit Unions, Credit Union National Association, and American Financial Services Association, each states that it is a non-profit corporation that has no parent corporation. No publicly held corporation owns 10% or more of the stock of any of the amici.
The Mortgage Bankers Association is a national association representing over 2,200 members of the real estate finance industry. For more information, visit https://www.mba.org/. The American Bankers Association is the principal national trade association of the financial services industry in the United States with members in all fifty states. For more information, visit https://www.aba.com/. The National Association of Federally-Insured Credit Unions advocates for all federally-insured not-for-profit credit unions that, in turn, serve over 127 million consumers with personal and small business financial service products. For more information, visit https://www.nafcu.org/. The Credit Union National Association is the largest trade association in the United States serving America’s credit unions. For more information, visit https://www.cuna.org/. American Financial Services Association, founded in 1916, is the national trade association for the consumer credit industry, protecting access to credit and consumer choice. For more information, visit https://afsaonline.org/. Amici are interested in this case because its outcome will directly impact their members, the finance industry more broadly, and the consumers whom Amici serve. All parties have consented to Amici filing this brief.
Amici write to provide important background about the informed use of convenience fees by consumers, and the constraints on the contents of mortgage loan agreements. They also write to emphasize why the construction advanced by Appellants and amicus curiae Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) of the phrase “permitted by law” in the Fair Debt Collection Practices Act (FDCPA) is improper, and will deprive consumers’ of important, cost-saving choices.
I. CONSUMERS MAKE INFORMED CHOICES KNOWING THE FEES INVOLVED WHEN DECIDING HOW TO PAY THEIR MORTGAGE
Consumers, like Plaintiffs-Appellants, knowingly elect to use a payment method for which they will be charged a convenience fee. Mortgage servicers generally offer borrowers many ways to make a monthly loan payment, including:
Download the amicus brief to read the full text.