“A bill to amend the Fair Credit Reporting Act to prohibit the inclusion of medical debt on a consumer report, and for other purposes.”
No CRS summary available for this bill.
This section amends the Fair Credit Reporting Act (FCRA) to (1) define "medical debt" in section 603 as a debt related to, in whole or in part, transactions, accounts, or balances arising from medical services, products, or devices; (2) replace the exclusion in section 605(a)(6) for certain medical information (previously limited to information treated confidentially under specified conditions) with a broader exclusion for any adverse information related to medical debt, including debts placed for collection, charged to profit or loss, or subject to similar action; and (3) make conforming amendments to section 604(g) by removing cross-references to the prior section 605(a)(6) exclusion in provisions limiting medical information disclosures for employment purposes. (Thus, consumer reporting agencies are prohibited from including any adverse medical debt information in consumer reports used for credit, employment, or other FCRA purposes.)
This section directs the Director of the Bureau of Consumer Financial Protection, not later than one year after enactment, to amend section 1022.30 of title 12, Code of Federal Regulations (or any successor regulation), to prohibit creditors from obtaining or using a consumer's medical debt information in decisions on whether to extend credit to that consumer. (As background, 12 CFR 1022.30 implements provisions of the Fair Credit Reporting Act governing permissible purposes for obtaining consumer reports in non-credit contexts such as employment or insurance.)