[Federal Register Volume 82, Number 112 (Tuesday, June 13, 2017)]
[Notices]
[Pages 27064-27066]
From the Federal Register Online via the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
[FR Doc No: 2017-12191]


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FEDERAL TRADE COMMISSION


Agency Information Collection Activities; Submission for OMB 
Review; Comment Request; Extension

AGENCY: Federal Trade Commission (``FTC'' or ``Commission'').

ACTION: Notice.

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SUMMARY: The FTC intends to ask the Office of Management and Budget 
(``OMB'') to extend for an additional three years the current Paperwork 
Reduction Act (``PRA'') clearance for the FTC's enforcement of the 
information collection requirements in its ``Fair Credit Reporting 
Risk-Based Pricing Regulations'' (``RBP Rule''), which applies to 
certain motor vehicle dealers, and its shared enforcement with the 
Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (``CFPB'') of the risk-based 
pricing provisions (subpart H) of the CFPB's Regulation V regarding 
other entities. That clearance expires on July 31, 2017.

DATES: Comments must be filed by July 13, 2017.

ADDRESSES: Interested parties may file a comment online or on paper, by 
following the instructions in the Request for Comment part of the 
SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION section below. Write ``RBP Rule, PRA Comment, 
P145403,'' on your comment and file your comment online at https://ftcpublic.commentworks.com/ftc/rbprulepra2 by following the 
instructions on the web-based form. If you prefer to file your comment 
on paper, write ``RBP Rule, PRA Comment, P145403'' on your comment and 
on the envelope, and mail your comment to the following address: 
Federal Trade Commission, Office of the Secretary, Room H-113 (Annex 
J), 600 Pennsylvania Avenue NW., Washington, DC 20580, or deliver your 
comment to the following address: Federal Trade Commission, Office of 
the Secretary, Constitution Center, 400 7th Street SW., 5th Floor, 
Suite 5610, Washington, DC 20024.

FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: Katherine White, Attorney, Division of 
Privacy and Identity Protection, Bureau of Consumer Protection, (202) 
326-2878, 600 Pennsylvania Ave. NW., Room CC-8232, Washington, DC 
20580.

SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: On March 3, 2017, the FTC sought public 
comment on the information collection requirements (creditor 
disclosures to consumers) associated with the RBP Rule and the 
Commission's shared enforcement with the CFPB of subpart H of 
Regulation V (March 3, 2017 Notice \1\) and the FTC's associated PRA 
burden analysis. One relevant comment was received.\2\ The commenter, 
the National Automobile Dealers Association (``NADA''), observed that 
many dealers face compliance costs beyond those that the FTC had 
estimated for respondents to modify and distribute notices:
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    \1\ 82 FR 12452.
    \2\ https://www.ftc.gov/policy/public-comments/initiative-702.


[[Page 27065]]


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    (a) Obtaining those reports, including (i) the direct costs from 
the CRA's, (ii) the personnel costs associated with obtaining the 
reports, and (b) the direct and indirect costs of properly handling, 
storing, and disposing of that sensitive personally identifiable 
information.

    Additionally, NADA contended that the FTC's estimate of hours 
burden does not contemplate the burden associated with ``obtaining, and 
properly handling, storing, and disposing of the information in the 
[credit] reports.''
    The FTC believes that its burden estimates do not need to be 
increased. NADA's suggestion that compliance with the Rule compels its 
members to purchase consumer credit scores is incorrect. Automobile 
dealers, and all other respondents, are covered by the Rule only if 
they already use consumer reports and/or credit scores to set the terms 
of credit they offer to consumers. Because respondents already are 
using consumer reports and have access to the information necessary to 
provide the notices, the Rule does not impose, directly or indirectly, 
the additional cost of purchasing consumer reports or credit scores.
    NADA's comment focuses on automobile dealers that are engaged in 
three-party financing transactions, in which a dealer agrees to extend 
financing to a consumer and then assigns the loan to a third party, 
such as a bank or financing company. In this scenario, automobile 
dealers will obtain certain personal information from consumers, along 
with an authorization to obtain their consumer reports, and will shop 
the information to several potential financing sources. These financing 
sources will pull consumer reports in order to determine the ``buy 
rate'' at which the financing source would agree to purchase the 
contract. The automobile dealer uses a consumer report in setting the 
retail financing rate for the credit because it uses the ``buy rate'' 
offered by the third-party financing source to set the rate offered to 
the consumer. In some instances, the dealer may not have physically 
accessed the consumer report. Nevertheless, the FTC has always 
maintained that the Rule covers these dealers since they are the 
original creditor in a transaction that uses a consumer report in 
connection with an application for, or a grant, extension, or other 
provision of, credit. The FTC's interpretation of the Rule was upheld 
by the DC District Court in Nat'l Auto Dealers Ass'n v. FTC, 854 F. 
Supp. 2d 65 (D.D.C. May 22, 2012).
    This interpretation that dealers are ``original'' creditors under 
the Rule does not impose the vast costs that NADA suggests. As the 
court in Nat'l Auto Dealers Ass'n noted in its decision, ``. . . given 
the preexisting channels between financing sources and auto dealers (to 
convey, for example, credit applications and loan rates), the dealer 
could get the credit information from the financing source as well . . 
. [the FTC's interpretation] does not mandate an impossibility nor does 
it obligate them to purchase a consumer report.'' \3\ Indeed, the 
dealer could require simply that the financing source pass on to the 
dealer the credit score it obtained on the consumer. Although the Rule 
does allow dealers to comply by providing all consumers with their 
credit scores, nothing in the Rule mandates this course of action.
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    \3\ Nat'l Auto Dealers Ass'n v. FTC, 864 F. Supp. 2d 65, n.17 
(D.D.C. May 22, 2012).
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    Moreover, automobile dealers already handle, maintain, store, and 
dispose of sensitive personal information about consumers (e.g., credit 
applications, financing contracts etc.). Thus, the FTC does not believe 
that the Rule imposes an additional burden when it comes to the 
handling, storing, and disposing of consumer report information.
    Pursuant to the OMB regulations, 5 CFR part 1320, that implement 
the PRA, 44 U.S.C. 3501 et seq., the FTC is providing this second 
opportunity for public comment while seeking OMB approval to renew 
clearance for the FTC's calculated share of the associated PRA burden 
for the underlying disclosure requirements.
    Burden statement:The burden figures below present estimates of the 
number of applicable motor vehicle dealers subject to the FTC's RBP 
Rule \4\ and their assumed recurring disclosure burden, in addition to 
the estimated number of and burden for other entities over which the 
FTC shares enforcement burden with the CFPB under subpart H of 
Regulation V. For more details about the creditor notifications 
required and the basis for the calculations summarized below, see the 
March 3, 2017 Notice.
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    \4\ The FTC retains rulemaking authority for its RBP Rule solely 
for motor vehicle dealers described in section 1029(a) of the Dodd-
Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act (Pub. L. 111-
203, 124 Stat. 1376 (2010)) that are predominantly engaged in the 
sale and servicing of motor vehicles, the leasing and servicing of 
motor vehicles, or both.
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    Title: Fair Credit Reporting Risk-Based Pricing Regulations.
    OMB Control Number: 3084-0145.
    Type of Review: Extension of currently approved collection.
    Estimated number of respondents: 160,250.
    Estimated Annual Burden: 9,652,500 hours and $174,127,650 \5\ in 
associated labor costs.
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    \5\ Bureau of Labor Statistics, Economic News Release, March 31, 
2017, Table 1, ``National employment and wage data from the 
Occupational Employment Statistics survey by occupation, May 2016'': 
http://www.bls.gov/news.release/ocwage.htm. This is an update of the 
labor information used in the March 3, 2017 Notice. The newer table 
shows $18.11 as the mean hourly wage for correspondence clerks, an 
increase from $17.47 previously used.
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    Estimated Capital or Other Non-Labor Costs: The FTC believes that 
the FTC and CFPB rules impose negligible capital or other non-labor 
costs, as the affected entities are likely to have the necessary 
supplies and/or equipment already (e.g., offices and computers) for the 
information collections discussed above.
    Request for Comment: You can file a comment online or on paper. For 
the Commission to consider your comment, we must receive it on or 
before July 13, 2017. Write ``RBP Rule, PRA Comment, P145403,'' on your 
comment. Your comment--including your name and your state--will be 
placed on the public record of this proceeding, including to the extent 
practicable, on the public Commission Web site, at https://www.ftc.gov/policy/public-comments.
    Postal mail addressed to the Commission is subject to delay due to 
heightened security screening. As a result, we encourage you to submit 
your comments online. To make sure that the Commission considers your 
online comment, you must file it at https://ftcpublic.commentworks.com/ftc/rbprulepra2, by following the instructions on the web-based form. 
If this Notice appears at http://www.regulations.gov/#!home, you also 
may file a comment through that Web site.
    If you file your comment on paper, write ``RBP Rule, PRA Comment, 
P145403'' on your comment and on the envelope, and mail your comment to 
the following address: Federal Trade Commission, Office of the 
Secretary, 600 Pennsylvania Avenue NW., Suite CC-5610 (Annex J), 
Washington, DC 20580, or deliver your comment to the following address: 
Federal Trade Commission, Office of the Secretary, Constitution Center, 
400 7th Street SW., 5th Floor, Suite 5610, Washington, DC 20024. If 
possible, please submit your paper comment to the Commission by courier 
or overnight service.
    Comments on the information collection requirements subject to 
review under the PRA should additionally be submitted to OMB. If sent 
by U.S. mail, they should be addressed to Office of Information and

[[Page 27066]]

Regulatory Affairs, Office of Management and Budget, Attention: Desk 
Officer for the Federal Trade Commission, New Executive Office 
Building, Docket Library, Room 10102, 725 17th Street NW., Washington, 
DC 20503. Comments sent to OMB by U.S. postal mail are subject to 
delays due to heightened security precautions. Thus, comments instead 
can also be sent via email to [email protected].
    Because your comment will be placed on the publicly accessible FTC 
Web site at https://www.ftc.gov/, you are solely responsible for making 
sure that your comment does not include any sensitive or confidential 
information. In particular, your comment should not include any 
sensitive personal information, such as your or anyone else's Social 
Security number; date of birth; driver's license number or other state 
identification number, or foreign country equivalent; passport number; 
financial account number; or credit or debit card number. You are also 
solely responsible for making sure that your comment does not include 
any sensitive health information, such as medical records or other 
individually identifiable health information. In addition, your comment 
should not include any ``trade secret or any commercial or financial 
information which . . . is privileged or confidential''--as provided by 
Section 6(f) of the FTC Act, 15 U.S.C. 46(f), and FTC Rule 4.10(a)(2), 
16 CFR 4.10(a)(2)--including in particular competitively sensitive 
information such as costs, sales statistics, inventories, formulas, 
patterns, devices, manufacturing processes, or customer names.
    Comments containing material for which confidential treatment is 
requested must be filed in paper form, must be clearly labeled 
``Confidential,'' and must comply with FTC Rule 4.9(c). In particular, 
the written request for confidential treatment that accompanies the 
comment must include the factual and legal basis for the request, and 
must identify the specific portions of the comment to be withheld from 
the public record. See FTC Rule 4.9(c). Your comment will be kept 
confidential only if the General Counsel grants your request in 
accordance with the law and the public interest. Once your comment has 
been posted on the public FTC Web site--as legally required by FTC Rule 
4.9(b)--we cannot redact or remove your comment from the FTC Web site, 
unless you submit a confidentiality request that meets the requirements 
for such treatment under FTC Rule 4.9(c), and the General Counsel 
grants that request.
    Visit the FTC Web site to read this Notice. The FTC Act and other 
laws that the Commission administers permit the collection of public 
comments to consider and use in this proceeding as appropriate. The 
Commission will consider all timely and responsive public comments that 
it receives on or before July 13, 2017. For information on the 
Commission's privacy policy, including routine uses permitted by the 
Privacy Act, see https://www.ftc.gov/site-information/privacy-policy.

    David C. Shonka,
Acting General Counsel.
[FR Doc. 2017-12191 Filed 6-12-17; 8:45 am]
 BILLING CODE 6750-01-P