Immediately before joining Venable, Allyson was an enforcement attorney at the CFPB, where she served as lead counsel in In the Matter of Discover Bank, which was one of the first enforcement actions in agency history and resulted in one of the largest agency settlements to date. She was a member of the initial team of attorneys hired to stand up the CFPB’s Office of Enforcement. As part of this effort, she helped formulate policies on litigation and investigations. She also led an office working group that created, reviewed, and coordinated research projects involving the application and jurisdiction of the Consumer Financial Protection Act and a group that coordinated the work of the Office of Enforcement and the CFPB’s Office of Fair Lending and Equal Opportunity.
Before joining the CFPB, Allyson was a trial attorney with the DOJ Tax Division, where she served as a first-chair trial counsel in a number of jury and bench trials involving complex financial transactions, including a test case involving the sale of credit life insurance and other credit insurance products by credit unions.
Since joining Venable in April 2013, Allyson has worked on some of the most significant and high-profile cases and investigations in the consumer financial services area.
Allyson also routinely counsels companies about all aspects of federal and state consumer finance laws. She advises companies about new consumer financial products and business models, and undertakes due diligence reviews. She has assisted companies and trade associations in their writing of comments for proposed CFPB rulemakings and requests for information. She is co-editor of Venable’s Consumer Financial Services Digest and regularly writes on topics related to financial services litigation and law enforcement. She also speaks extensively at industry conferences and events, and is frequently quoted in the media on current consumer financial services issues.