Hawaii Attorney General Joins Bipartisan Coalition to Protect Homeowners

Hawaii Attorney General Clare E. Connors joined a bipartisan of 33 attorneys general in opposing a proposed class action settlement that prohibits a mortgage servicer to profit from illegal payment processing fees charged to nearly one million homeowners paying their mortgage online or by phone.

The coalition opposes a proposed settlement wherein mortgage servicer PHH Mortgage Corporation and its predecessor corporation, Ocwen Loan Servicing, LLC to be able to continue to profit from illegal processing fees the company has been charging to homeowners.

Over the yers, PHH has charged homeowners an illegal fee ranging from $7.50 to $17.50. The illegal fee is charged each time a homeowner made a monthly mortgage payment online or by phone. There is nothing on the homeowner’s mortgage contracts that allows such fees.  Moreover, customers paying via check or automatic debit payments are changed by the illegal fee.

The coalition disapproves with the inadequacy of the monetary relief as the proposed settlement is planned to ensure that a portion of the monetary relief for the homeowners will still end up in PHH’s hands.

“The proposed class action settlement is unconscionable because it allows a bad actor to continue acting badly,” said Attorney General Connors.

“Moreover, it does little to make whole the homeowners who have been harmed by these illegal fees and does not present an acceptable resolution for impacted Hawaii residents.”

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published.

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.