Equal Credit Opportunity Act (Regulation B)

The Equal Credit Opportunity Act (“ECOA”) was enacted to ensure that credit is made available to all creditworthy applicants without discrimination on the basis of sex, marital status, race, color, religion, national origin, age, or other prohibited bases under the ECOA. The ECOA allows for creditors to collect information for self-testing against these criteria, while not allowing creditors to use this information in making credit decisions of applicants. For certain mortgage applications, the ECOA requires creditors to ask for some of the prohibited information for monitoring purposes. In addition, for certain mortgage applications, creditors are required to send a copy of any appraisal or written valuation used in the application process to the applicant in a timely fashion. The ECOA also prescribes that creditors inform applicants of decisions made on credit applications. In particular, where creditors make adverse actions on credit applications or existing accounts, creditors must inform consumers as to why the adverse action was taken, such that credit applicants can challenge errors or learn how to become more creditworthy. Creditors must retain all application information for 25 months, including notices they sent and any information related to adverse actions. Finally, the ECOA requires creditors who furnish applicant information to a consumer reporting agency to reflect participation of the applicant’s spouse, if the spouse if permitted to use or contractually liable on the account.

The latest form for Equal Credit Opportunity Act (Regulation B) expires 2022-08-31 and can be found here.