Agency Information Collection Activities; Submission for OMB Review; Comment Request; Extension

AGENCY:

Federal Trade Commission (“FTC” or “Commission”).

ACTION:

Notice.

SUMMARY:

The FTC intends to ask the Office of Management and Budget (“OMB”) to extend for an additional three years the current Paperwork Reduction Act (“PRA”) clearance for the FTC's shared enforcement with the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (“CFPB”) of the disclosure requirements in subpart N of Regulation V (“Rule”). That clearance expires on December 31, 2015.

DATES:

Comments must be filed by November 27, 2015.

ADDRESSES:

Interested parties may file a comment online or on paper, by following the instructions in the Request for Comment part of the SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION section below. Write “Subpart N of Regulation V, PRA Comment, P125403,” on your comment. File your comment online at https://ftcpublic.commentworks.com/ftc/regulationVsubpartNpra2 by following the instructions on the Web-based form. If you prefer to file your comment on paper, mail your comment to the following address: Federal Trade Commission, Office of the Secretary, 600 Pennsylvania Avenue NW., Suite CC-5610 (Annex J), Washington, DC 20580, or deliver your comment to the following address: Federal Trade Commission, Office of the Secretary, Constitution Center, 400 7th Street SW., 5th Floor, Suite 5610 (Annex J), Washington, DC 20024.

FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT:

Requests for additional information should be addressed to Ryan Mehm, Attorney, Bureau of Consumer Protection, (202) 326-2918, Federal Trade Commission, 600 Pennsylvania Ave. NW., Washington, DC 20580.

SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION:

On August 6, 2015, the FTC sought public comment on the information collection requirements associated with subpart N (80 FR 46988). No relevant comments were received. That Notice details staff's methodology behind the estimates restated here in summary form, while also providing an overview of the Rule and the underlying authorizing statute.

Pursuant to the OMB regulations, 5 CFR part 1320, that implement the PRA, 44 U.S.C. 3501 et seq., the FTC is providing a second opportunity for the public to comment on:

(1) Whether the disclosure requirements are necessary, including whether the information will be practically useful; (2) the accuracy of our burden estimates, including whether the methodology and assumptions used are valid; (3) ways to enhance the quality, utility, and clarity of the information to be collected; and (4) ways to minimize the burden of the collection of information.

As before, the Commission specifically seeks more recent estimates of the number of requests consumers are making for free annual file disclosures. In addition to data on the number of requests, data on how the number of requests has changed over time, and how these requests are being received—by Internet, phone, or by mail—would be most helpful toward refining the FTC's burden estimates.

The following summarizes the FTC net burden estimates resulting from the analysis detailed in the August 6, 2015 Notice.

1. Annual File Disclosures Provided Through the Internet:

a. 8,320 hours

b. $545,126 in labor costs to negotiate or renegotiate outsourced service contracts

2. Annual File Disclosures Requested Over the Telephone:

a. 6,240 hours

b. $408,845 in labor costs to negotiate or renegotiate outsourced service contracts

3. Annual File Disclosures Requiring Processing by Mail:

a. 347,083 hours

b. $5,747,694 in labor costs

4. Instructions to Consumers:

a. 34,708 hours

b. $574,764 in labor costs

5. Non-labor/capital costs: $11,931,500 (costs paid to third-party contractors to phone and internet capacity to handle increasing consumer request volume)

6. Net Burden to FTC After 50:50 Split with the CFPB

a. 198,176 hours

b. $3,638,215 associated labor costs

c. $5,965,750 non-labor/capital costs

Request for Comment: You can file a comment online or on paper. For the Commission to consider your comment, we must receive it on or before November 27, 2015. Write “Subpart N of Regulation V, PRA Comment, P125403” on your comment. Your comment—including your name and your state—will be placed on the public record of this proceeding, including to the extent practicable, on the public Commission Web site, at http://www.ftc.gov/os/publiccomments.shtm. As a matter of discretion, the Commission tries to remove individuals' home contact information from comments before placing them on the Commission Web site.

Because your comment will be made public, you are solely responsible for making sure that your comment does not include any sensitive personal information, like anyone's Social Security number, date of birth, driver's license number or other state identification number or foreign country equivalent, passport number, financial account number, or credit or debit card number. You are also solely responsible for making sure that your comment does not include any sensitive health information, like medical records or other individually identifiable health information. In addition, do not include any “[t]rade secret or any commercial or financial information which is . . . privileged or confidential” as provided in Section 6(f) of the FTC Act 15 U.S.C. 46(f), and FTC Rule 4.10(a)(2), 16CFR 4.10(a)(2). In particular, do not include competitively sensitive information such as costs, sales statistics, inventories, formulas, patterns, devices, manufacturing processes, or customer names.

If you want the Commission to give your comment confidential treatment, you must file it in paper form, with a request for confidential treatment, and you have to follow the procedure explained in FTC Rule 4.9(c). Your comment will be kept confidential only if the FTC General Counsel grants your request in accordance with the law and the public interest.

Postal mail addressed to the Commission is subject to delay due to heightened security screening. As a result, we encourage you to submit your comments online. To make sure that the Commission considers your online comment, you must file it at https://ftcpublic.commentworks.com/ftc/regulationVsubpartNpra2,, by following the instructions on the Web-based form. When this Notice appears at http://www.regulations.gov/#!home,, you also may file a comment through that Web site.

If you file your comment on paper, write “Subpart N of Regulation V, PRA Comment, P125403,” on your comment and on the envelope. You can mail your comment to the following address: Federal Trade Commission, Office of the Secretary, 600 Pennsylvania Avenue NW., Suite CC-5610 (Annex J), Washington, DC 20580, or deliver your comment to the following address: Federal Trade Commission, Office of the Secretary, Constitution Center, 400 7th Street SW., 5th Floor, Suite 5610 (Annex J), Washington, DC 20024.

The FTC Act and other laws that the Commission administers permit the collection of public comments to consider and use in this proceeding as appropriate. The Commission will consider all timely and responsive public comments that it receives on or before November 27, 2015. You can find more information, including routine uses permitted by the Privacy Act, in the Commission's privacy policy, at http://www.ftc.gov/ftc/privacy.htm.

Comments on the information collection requirements subject to review under the PRA should additionally be submitted to OMB. If sent by U.S. mail, they should be addressed to Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs, Office of Management and Budget, Attention: Desk Officer for the Federal Trade Commission, New Executive Office Building, Docket Library, Room 10102, 725 17th Street NW., Washington, DC 20503. Comments sent to OMB by U.S. postal mail, however, are subject to delays due to heightened security precautions. Thus, comments instead should be sent by facsimile to (202) 395-5806.