[Federal Register Volume 86, Number 43 (Monday, March 8, 2021)]
[Notices]
[Pages 13379-13380]
From the Federal Register Online via the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
[FR Doc No: 2021-04689]


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FEDERAL RESERVE SYSTEM


Agency Information Collection Activities: Announcement of Board 
Approval Under Delegated Authority and Submission to OMB

AGENCY: Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System.

SUMMARY: The Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System (Board) 
is adopting a proposal to extend for three years, with revision, the 
Government-Administered, General-Use Prepaid Card Surveys (FR 3063; OMB 
No. 7100-0343). The revisions are applicable as of the data collection 
administered during the first half of 2021.

FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: 
    Federal Reserve Board Clearance Officer--Nuha Elmaghrabi--Office of 
the Chief Data Officer, Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve 
System, Washington, DC 20551, (202) 452-3829.
    Office of Management and Budget (OMB) Desk Officer--Shagufta 
Ahmed--Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs, Office of 
Management and Budget, New Executive Office Building, Room 10235, 725 
17th Street NW, Washington, DC 20503, or by fax to (202) 395-6974.

SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: On June 15, 1984, OMB delegated to the Board 
authority under the PRA to approve and assign OMB control numbers to 
collections of information conducted or sponsored by the Board. Board-
approved collections of information are incorporated into the official 
OMB inventory of currently approved collections of information. The OMB 
inventory, as well as copies of the PRA Submission, supporting 
statements, and approved collection of information instrument(s) are 
available at https://www.reginfo.gov/public/do/PRAMain. These documents 
are also available on the Federal Reserve Board's public website at 
https://www.federalreserve.gov/apps/reportforms/review.aspx or may be 
requested from the agency clearance officer, whose name appears above.
    Final Approval Under OMB Delegated Authority of the Extension for 
Three Years, With Revision, of the Following Information Collection:
    Report title: Government-Administered, General-Use Prepaid Card 
Surveys.
    Agency form number: FR 3063.
    OMB control number: 7100-0343.
    Effective Date: As of the data collection administered during the 
first half of 2021.
    Frequency: Annually.
    Respondents: Depository institutions that administer general-use 
prepaid cards.
    Estimated number of respondents: 15.
    Estimated average hours per response: 10.
    Estimated annual burden hours: 150.
    General description of report: The issuer survey (FR 3063a) 
collects data

[[Page 13380]]

from issuers of government-administered, general-use prepaid cards 
including information on the pre-paid card program, the number of cards 
outstanding, card funding, ATM transactions, purchase transactions, 
fees paid by issuers to third parties, interchange fees, and cardholder 
fees. The issuer survey (FR 3063a) is mandatory. The government survey 
(FR 3063b), which is being discontinued, was designed to collect data 
from state governments, the District of Columbia, and U.S. territories 
(collectively ``state governments''), and municipal government offices 
located within the United States (local government offices) that 
administer general-use prepaid card payment programs.\1\ It was 
intended that the FR 3063b survey would collect similar information 
from state governments and local government offices to supplement the 
information collected from card issuers in the FR 3063a survey on the 
usage of general-use prepaid cards in federal, state or local 
government-administered payment programs. However, the FR 3063b was 
voluntary, and the Board has not issued this survey to state 
governments or local government offices in the past three years because 
relevant information on the use of prepaid cards was obtained from the 
FR 3063a survey.
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    \1\ The government survey may be distributed to federal 
government agencies in addition to state and local governments and 
U.S. territories, but collections of information from federal 
government agencies are not subject to the Paperwork Reduction Act 
and, thus, are not included in this discussion. U.S. territories 
include American Samoa, Guam, Midway Islands, Northern Mariana 
Islands, Puerto Rico, and U.S. Virgin Islands.
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    The Board uses data from the FR 3063a survey to support an annual 
report to Congress on the prevalence of use of general-use prepaid 
cards in federal, state, and local government-administered payment 
programs and on the interchange and cardholder fees charged with 
respect to such use of such cards.
    Legal authorization and confidentiality: The issuer survey is 
authorized by subsection 920(a)(7) of the Electronic Fund Transfer Act, 
15 U.S.C. 1693o-2(a)(7), which was added by section 1075(a) of the 
Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act. This 
subsection requires the Board to submit an annual report to Congress on 
the prevalence of the use of general-use prepaid cards in federal, 
state, or local government-administered payment programs and the 
interchange transaction fees and card-holder fees charged with respect 
to the use of such general-use prepaid cards (15 U.S.C. 1693o-
2(a)(7)(D)). It also provides the Board with authority to require 
issuers to provide information to enable the Board to carry out the 
provisions of the subsection (15 U.S.C. 1693o-2(a)(3)(B)). The 
obligation of issuers to respond to the issuer survey is mandatory. The 
Board generally regards the information collected from each individual 
issuer on the FR 3063a survey as confidential commercial and financial 
information, which may be protected by exemption 4 of the Freedom of 
Information Act (5 U.S.C. 552(b)(4)). The Board, however, may publicly 
release aggregate or summary information in a way that does not reveal 
the individual issuer.
    Current actions: On November 19, 2020, the Board published a notice 
in the Federal Register (85 FR 73708) requesting public comment for 60 
days on the extension, with revision, of the Government-Administered, 
General-Use Prepaid Card Surveys. The Board proposed to revise and 
streamline the FR 3063a reporting structure to reduce burden on 
respondents by deleting various questions, which are no longer 
necessary to support the Board's annual report. In addition, the Board 
proposed to discontinue the FR 3063b. The comment period for this 
notice expired on January 19, 2021. The Board did not receive any 
comments. The revisions will be implemented as proposed.

    Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System, March 2, 2021.
Michele Taylor Fennell,
Deputy Associate Secretary of the Board.
[FR Doc. 2021-04689 Filed 3-5-21; 8:45 am]
BILLING CODE 6210-01-P