New Biden-Harris rules will target companies that waste consumers’ time | Real Time Headlines

Biden administration A new multi-agency regulatory initiative was unveiled on Monday, targeting corporate practices that officials claim are designed to waste consumers’ time and unnecessarily burden them with red tape in order to maximize profits.

“I think we can all understand that,” White House domestic policy adviser Neera Tanden told reporters on Friday.

“For example, you want to cancel a gym membership or a subscription to a service or a newspaper. It used to take one or two clicks to sign up. But now… you have to go in person, or wait 20 minutes… just select Quit,” she said.

Dubbed “Time is Money,” these initiatives will make it easier for consumers to cancel subscriptions, refunds, submit health care and online insurance forms and receive high-quality customer service.

The new measure comes at a unique moment in the Biden administration. Democratic presidential candidates and vice presidents Kamala Harris is preparing to unveil the first economic policy plan of her presidential campaign this week.

A broad effort like “Time is Money” could provide Harris with an opportunity to advance the Biden administration’s longstanding consumer protection mission in new ways.

“In all of these practices, these companies are delaying service to you or really trying to make it difficult for you to cancel service so that they can hold on to your money for longer and longer,” Tanden said Friday.

New measures announced Monday include a set of rules from the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) that will target customer service “doomsday loops” and ineffective chatbots used by some financial institutions.

“The CFPB will determine when the use of automated chatbots or automated AI recordings is unlawful, including in situations where customers believe they are talking to a human,” the White House fact sheet said.

Meanwhile, the U.S. Federal Communications Commission (FCC) will launch a parallel investigation into whether to expand the CFPB’s proposed customer service requirements to include phone, broadband and cable TV providers.

The FCC’s second investigation will consider requirements similar to those currently required by the FTC “Click to cancel” proposal. The FTC plan would require companies to make canceling subscriptions and memberships as easy as signing up.

The initiative also calls on health insurance companies to allow policyholders to submit claims online.

Health and Human Services Secretary Xavier Becerra and Acting Secretary of Labor Julie Su will send a letter to health insurance companies and group health plans on Monday urging them to “take concrete actions to save money when interacting with healthcare providers.” people’s time and money”. their health insurance,” according to a White House fact sheet.

However, not all “time is money” initiatives are new. Several of these are previously announced actions, including a rule issued by the Transportation Department in April requiring airlines to automatically issue cash refund.

Another existing effort cited by the White House is a June 2023 FTC proposal targeting companies that use deceptive customers Giving back to practicesuch as fake reviews.

A senior administration official said none of the Time is Money initiative’s actions require congressional approval. With Republicans currently in control of the House of Representatives, any new consumer protection legislation will face great difficulty.

Monday’s “time is money” initiative is the latest in a series of aggressive consumer protection actions taken by the Biden administration over the past three years.

The White House has been pursuing a radical antitrust regulations and a highly skeptical approach to cryptocurrencies, both of which have angered Wall Street.

Biden also supports fighting the label he’s been labeled “Unfair and illegal pricing” including the so-called Garbage feecompanies “gouging up prices”, etc. contraction and expansion.

Still, White House officials insisted to reporters on Friday that “this is not about humiliating companies.”

Instead, the “time is money” initiative represents “a new frontier in consumer protection,” the official said. “That’s the way we think.”