Third, we are developing powerful new tools for all consumers, including older Americans. For those who feel disempowered by the confusing explanations provided for many financial products, we have created our "Ask CFPB" tool. This interactive database has over a thousand answers to questions most commonly asked by consumers. When you encounter a particular issue, you can go to Ask CFPB to learn more about it and understand your rights.
So in these ways the Consumer Bureau is working on behalf of more than 300 million American consumers. But the law that created our new agency specifically recognized the need to protect older Americans against financial exploitation and promote economic security later in life. With the aging of the baby boomer generation, that mission has never been more important. This is especially so for two central themes of the White House Conference on Aging: retirement security and elder justice. Our Office for Older Americans is dedicated to addressing these issues. It has enjoyed top-flight leadership, first from Hubert Humphrey III and now from Nora Dowd Eisenhower — two individuals who became leaders on these issues at the state level before bringing that same commitment to the federal level at the new Consumer Bureau. Let me describe how we are making progress in both of these areas.
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Our Office for Older Americans has done much great work around retirement security. Our team has traveled the country listening to older Americans. Based on what we heard, we issued studies, guides, and advisories to arm seniors and their caregivers with the information and tools they need to protect themselves and their precious retirement savings.
One of our first reports to Congress exposed problems with so-called "senior designation" credentials that many financial advisers use to market their services to older Americans. We identified more than fifty different senior designations that financial advisers use to indicate that they have advanced training or expertise in the financial needs of older consumers. Many of these credentials are flimsy at best, yet they can confuse older consumers, who are already at risk for deception and fraud. Based on those findings, we made recommendations to policy makers to help older consumers by implementing rigorous training standards and increasing supervision and enforcement.
In another report, we found that debt collection is a top complaint for older Americans, just as it is for younger consumers. So we issued a consumer advisory to help older Americans deal with harassing debt collectors. We let them know that their federal benefits are legally protected against these risks, and we explained how they can dispute debts they believe are false or inaccurate.
We have also done much work on reverse mortgages, starting with a comprehensive report on the industry that we published three years ago. We have produced a guide to help consumers assess the pros and cons of this product, and for those who already have a reverse mortgage, we have offered tips on how to plan ahead to avoid financial hardships that may result from certain mortgage terms. We have also analyzed our consumer complaints on reverse mortgages, which showed that many older consumers are quite frustrated with loan terms, servicing runarounds, and foreclosure problems. We are helping many seniors who filed these complaints, and we are prioritizing these issues for oversight and enforcement.
Protecting older consumers also means supporting those who love and take care of them. So we put out a guide to help assisted living and nursing home staff better protect the people in their care by preventing and addressing financial abuse and scams. Many seniors are vulnerable, and our guide helps their caretakers deal with financial mistreatment by family members or others who are handling the finances of an incapacitated adult.
About 22 million people who are age 60 or older have named someone as an agent under a power of attorney to make financial decisions for them – and millions more have court-appointed guardians or other fiduciaries. The vast majority of those designated to serve in these capacities are trying their best to do the right thing, but they often have no training. We have published guides, called "Managing Someone Else’s Money," to help family members and friends better understand their role in serving as financial caregivers. These guides are written in plain language and are designed to apply to four different types of fiduciaries. Each guide tells them about their duties, how to prevent and respond to financial exploitation and scams, and where to go for additional help.
In partnership with the FDIC, we have also developed resources that provide financial education for older consumers and their caregivers. "Money Smart for Older Adults" uses a train-the-trainer approach that makes it easy for instructors to provide practical guidance for a safe and secure financial future. Instructors can include financial institution staff, senior organizations, adult protective services agencies, law enforcement, and others who serve this population.
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