Introduction to the 2002 Annual Survey of Consumer Financial Services Law

In the Introduction to each of the previous two Annual Surveys, the authors opined that an important challenge for consumer financial services law and lawyers in the twenty-first century is to rationalize that area of law by creating a clearer and more simple and uniform system of rules to govern everyday consumer financial transactions. In other words, to do for consumer financial services law what the Uniform Commercial Code (U.C.C.) did for commercial transactions. Last year, the National Conference of Commissioners on Uniform State Laws (NCCUSL) took a step in that direction by promulgating the Uniform Consumer Leases Act (UCLA) for possible enactment by the states. That enactment would make the law in this area uniform on both the federal and state levels, and do much to smoothly coordinate the two. The UCLA is intended to supplement U.C.C. Article 2A on leases of goods and the federal Consumer Leasing Act and its implementing Regulation M, but with a broader scope than the federal law. Essentially, the UCLA requires compliance with the federal law for all transactions the state law covers (even though leases over $25,000 are not covered by the federal statute and regulations). The UCLA also mandates other disclosures, limits lease terms and lessor practices, and provides remedies.