Articles

In the July/August issue of ABA Bank Compliance, Heidi Wier authored an article entitled, Four Pillars of an Effective HMDA Compliance Program, Keys to Successful Data Integrity and Accurate Fair Lending Performance Analysis. Complete and accurate HMDA data is essential to understanding where and to whom loans are being made. Regulators have signaled that continued and enhanced scrutiny should be expected. Learn more about how establishing a comprehensive HMDA compliance program will ensure the accuracy of your HDMA data, and when analyzed effectively, it will in turn help manage your fair lending risk.

Tracey Levandoski authored this informative article published in the May/June 2021 issues of ABA Bank Compliance. Enforcement actions for UDAAP violations are likely to increase, and UDAAP risk should be on the minds of every bank’s marketing manager. Supervisory highlights from the CFPB include references to misleading advertisements of bonus offers on deposit accounts, misleading representation about the ability to apply for a loan online, and false representations that no credit check will be conducted on loan applicants. When examiners review the bank’s UDAAP risk as part of compliance examinations, you will need to explain to examiners, with supporting documentation, how UDAAP risk has been mitigated. Now is the time to review the bank’s marketing and advertising plans, including policies and procedures, with an eye to potential UDAAP pitfalls.

In the January/February 2021 issue of ABA Bank Compliance, Liza Warner provides insight into how a bank can use the results of the March 2020 Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) Consumer Response Annual Report as a reference point to analyze its own complaints. In 2019, the period covered by this report, there were over 350,000 complaints received. By comparing the CFPB complaint data with its own data, the bank can start to identify patterns, trends, and findings that warrant reporting to key stakeholders including business line management, risk management, compliance, senior management, and the Board of Directors. Gain insight into the top five complaint areas in this informative article.

If you are looking for more information about implementing a consumer complaint response process, there is a new resource available through the MBA’s education program. Managing Consumer Complaints for Compliance Professionals, is a new course that Heidi Wier worked on with the MBA. This course presents foundational concepts to help companies improve their consumer complaint […]

In the Fall 2020 issue of California Mortgage Finance News, Monika McCarthy authored an article entitled, Combating Current Legal Threats, Tips for Mortgage Lenders and Servicers. She addresses three key threats that have emerged since the pandemic that impact California mortgage lenders and servicers: 1) fair servicing issues, 2) fair lending issues, and 3) the unknown effect of the revamped Department of Business Oversight, now the Department of Financial Protection and Innovation.

In the November/December issue of ABA Bank Compliance, Jim Treacy addresses how banks can build an appropriate BSA/AML/OFAC Compliance Program. Jim covers performing an enterprise-wide BSA/AML/OFAC risk assessment, as well as developing a customer risk profile for each individual money service business (MSB). He also describes ongoing monitoring of MSB customers and MSB red flags that raise potential concerns. Although banking MSB customers comes with BSA/AML risks, these risks can be managed through a strong and effective BSA/AML/OFAC Program.

In this article, published in the Utah Banker, Tracey Levandoski discusses the risks to consider and the decisions to be made as banks accelerate their digital strategies through partnerships with fintech lenders. In addition to reviewing the regulatory guidance for managing third-party risk, she addresses the evaluation process in terms of lending experience and expertise as well as regulatory compliance considerations such as the fintech’s CMS. Other topics include evaluation of the fintech’s credit model, the use of alternative data, and considerations for marketing and advertising.

In the September/October issue of ABA Bank Compliance, the authors address the importance of establishing internal monitoring systems for servicing. The article includes a comparison of quality assurance and quality control as well as considerations for reporting results and exceptions, the regulatory change control process for servicing, servicing transfers and loan boarding, and managing consumer complaints. Eliminating the surprise element related to regulatory, legal, financial, and reputational risks benefits the servicer and demonstrates a strong commitment for maintaining an effective internal control system.

In this article, published in the Summer 2020 issue of ACUMA Pipeline, Patti Katzban and Liza Warner discuss the best practices for credit unions in vetting financial technology partners (fintechs) to optimize the overall mortgage experience. There are many risks to consider and decisions to be made. Learn more about the key considerations from these knowledgeable experts.

In the July/August issue of ABA Bank Compliance, Mollie Newsome Sudhoff discusses compliance monitoring in the time of COVID-19. Learn more about the best practices in keeping pace with change, especially in some of the key impact areas.

In the July/August issue of ABA Bank Compliance, Heidi Wier discusses how auditors can partner with compliance, while still maintaining independence, ease the impact of ongoing regulatory changes and emerging issues such as COVID-19, increase audit effectiveness and add additional value to the organization.

In this article published in the May/June 2020 issue of ABA Bank Compliance, Tracey Levandoski, CRCM, describes how banks can help their fintech partners develop an effective path to building a compliance infrastructure. She addresses the various points of the “journey” to the destination of a fully functional compliance management system (CMS) that meets the regulators’s requirements as well as the bank’s expectations under its third-party risk management program.

In this new ABA Bank Compliance article, Fair Lending Audit – Seeing the Forest for the Trees, Liza Warner discusses how a fair lending internal audit helps an institution gain a clear and objective understanding of fair lending compliance risk. As a key area of regulatory scrutiny, and one that garners a lot of public attention, financial institutions must proactively manage fair lending risk exposure. This can be challenging because the requirements and principles touch all aspects of the lending process and require attention, not just to the trees – the technical regulatory details, processes, systems, and data, but to the forest – the attitudes, behaviors, and actions of its employees.

Published in Western Banker, this article addresses how strong compliance programs effectively navigate the challenging environment of fair lending compliance. This informative article describes how the key ingredient to success is establishing a connection between risk assessment and performance analysis.

The cover story of the July-August issue of ABA Bank Compliance magazine, How to Maintain Fair and Responsible Servicing Practices, was co-authored by Liza Warner and Karen Cullen. In this article, the authors address how compliance officers can guide their organizations in successfully navigating an evolving compliance landscape by identifying and mitigating compliance risk in all aspects of account servicing, including fair lending and UDAAP. Weaving regulatory requirements throughout the servicing process will enhance service quality and make sure the organization exceeds customer expectations, differentiates itself in the marketplace and avoids regulatory land mines.

The cover story of the 2019 May-June issue of ABA Bank Compliance was written by Liza Warner. The article is about adapting and advancing in the evolving financial services landscape. She covers the role that compliance officers play in supporting banks’ strategic goals through change management and provides a framework for how compliance professionals can manage change effectively. The article includes an overview of managing change, both for new or changing products and services, and outlines change management success factors.

Published in the April 19, 2019 issue of Compliance Action, this article addresses lessons learned from past fair lending consent orders. Adequate fair lending risk management requires not only awareness of potential fair lending risk, but an understanding of how that risk is affected by the institution’s programs and how those programs are executed. Only then can adequate controls be developed to mitigate the risk and monitoring be developed to gauge the effectiveness of those controls.

Published in the April 2019 issue of Mortgage Compliance Magazine, this article discusses how decreasing volumes and shifts toward new products have led to a new mindset regarding quality control. How do lenders who are successful with quality control adopt strategies that not only keep them compliant with investor, warehouse lender and regulatory requirements, but also lower costs, improve loan quality, and provide for competitive advantage by allowing them to more rapidly add new products?

In the Winter 2019 issue of ACUMA Pipeline, Todd Krell provides insights for credit unions to the question – Is It Time to Review Your Quality  Assurance Program and Your Quality Control Plan?

Published in the November-December 2018 issue of Western Banker, this article addresses the challenges of doing a fair lending review of commercial lending.