Nearly 4 million households that were to be mailed paper checks will instead receive their pandemic relief aid via prepaid debit cards issued by MetaBank.
The prepaid card issuer will rely less on promotional marketing and more on its banking charter to drive profits, Henry said in his first public remarks since taking over as CEO in March.
The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau wants to make it easier for those who lack bank accounts to receive pandemic relief payments authorized by Congress.
Five Democrats on the Senate Banking Committee sent a letter to Director Kathy Kraninger calling the agency's response to COVID-19 “tepid and ineffectual at best.”
The agency has relaxed some reporting requirements and joined other regulators in encouraging banks to help borrowers, but pressure is building on the bureau to do more to aid consumers suffering financial hardship.
The reprieve from mortgage data collection was among several changes to the agency’s supervisory and enforcement procedures to help firms responding to the COVID-19 pandemic.
Comerica Bank won another five-year contract from the Treasury Department to run the prepaid Direct Express card program despite criticism of how it handled past fraud cases and customer service blunders.
