Release Date: February 5, 2004

For immediate release

The Federal Reserve Board on Thursday announced its approval of final rules
to establish effective dates for all provisions of the Fair and Accurate
Credit Transactions Act of 2003 (FACT Act) that do not have a statutorily
prescribed effective date. These regulations are being issued jointly with
the Federal Trade Commission.

The recently enacted FACT Act amended the Fair Credit Reporting Act (FCRA)
and required the Board and the FTC to adopt final rules establishing the
effective dates for certain provisions of the FACT Act. In mid-December, the
Board and the FTC jointly adopted interim final rules that established
December 31, 2003 as the effective date for the preemption provisions of the
FACT Act as well as provisions authorizing the agencies to adopt rules or
take other actions to implement the FACT Act. The agencies now have adopted
final joint rules with the same schedule of effective dates contained in the
interim rules.

Also in mid-December, the Board and the FTC jointly issued for comment
proposed joint rules that would establish a schedule of effective dates for
other provisions of the FACT Act that do not contain effective dates. After
reviewing the comments on the proposal, the agencies now have adopted joint
final rules that establish March 31, 2004 as the effective date for the
provisions of the FACT Act that do not require significant changes to
business procedures. With respect to other provisions that likely entail
significant changes to business procedures, the joint final rules make these
provisions effective on December 1, 2004, to allow industry a reasonable
time to establish systems to comply with the statute.