Summary of Consumer Rights

Effective September 21, employers and background check companies need to begin using a new model, discussing the summary of consumer rights, with “A Summary of Your Rights Under the Fair Credit Reporting Act” disclosure document. This document was released on September 12 by the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB). This new model will replace the old one, and employers must remember their responsibility to provide this form to prospective employees and current employees for whom they are conducting background checks. Failure to provide this notification can lead to class action litigation.

The Summary of Rights was updated in response to recent high profile data breaches. In May, Congress passed the Economic Growth, Regulatory Relief and Consumer Protection Act, which in a nutshell requires credit bureaus to provide fraud alerts to consumers, as well as national security freezes and freeze releases.

Lastly, this new law mandates that whenever an employer provides the “Summary of Your Rights Under the Fair Credit Reporting Act”, or the “Summary of Consumer Identity Theft Rights”, they must also provide a notice that informs the consumer for the new security freeze rights as outlined above.

To avoid any gaps in compliance, you should begin using the updated forms by September 21, 2018. PeopleG2 provides these updated forms to their clients. They can be found by clicking this link, Release Forms or by going to the PeopleG2 website.