Civil Monetary Penalty Inflation Adjustment

Congress, in the Federal Civil Penalties Inflation Adjustment Act of 1990, as amended by the Debt Collection Improvement Act of 1996, required all federal agencies with the authority to impose civil monetary penalties (CMPs) to regularly evaluate those CMPs to ensure that they continue to maintain their deterrent value. As a result of these acts, the head of each agency was required, by October 23, 1996, and at least once every four years thereafter, to adjust its CMPs for inflation. In 1996, the National Credit Union Administration (NCUA) issued a final rule to implement the required adjustments to certain CMPs authorized by the Federal Credit Union Act. Since that time, NCUA has discovered several more CMPs that should also be adjusted for inflation. In order to comply with Congress' mandate to adjust CMPs for inflation at least every four years, NCUA is issuing this final rule to implement the required adjustments to those CMPs.