On January 30, 2025, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) announced that it had entered into a consent order with an international remittance company regarding the company’s use of deceptive advertising for fee amounts and failure to properly disclose applicable fees, in violation of both the Consumer Financial Protection Act (CFPA) and the Electronic Fund Transfer Act (EFTA).
According to the CFPB, the UK based company engaged in deceptive advertising to its US customers. First, the company sent out mass advertisements stating that 80% of its customers would pay lower ATM and other fees but failed to advertise that few, if any, of those customers were in the United States. Further, the CFPB alleged that despite leading US customers to believe they were eligible for two free withdrawals of up to $200 each, the company only allowed US customers two free withdraws of $100 each.
The CFPB further alleged that the company failed to disclose applicable fees to customers, such as failing to disclose fees for using a credit card to fund a transfer and failing to disclose exchange rates. Finally, the CFPB accused the company of failing to refund fees when funds were not available to the recipient in the set amount of time.
Pursuant to the consent order, the company agreed to pay a civil monetary penalty of $2.025 million and to pay an additional $450,000 for the purpose of providing redress to affected consumers.
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