78.— Section 149 of the Consumer Credit Act 1995 is amended—

(a) in subsection (5) by substituting “3 months” for “4 months”,

(b) in subsection (6) by substituting “3 months” for “3 weeks”,

(c) by inserting the following after subsection (6):

“(6A) In calculating the periods of 3 months specified in subsections (5) and (6) no account shall be taken of any day on which any information required by the Bank to be provided by the credit institution for the performance of the Bank’s functions under this section has not yet been so provided.”,

and

(d) by inserting the following after subsection (14):

“(15) A direction given under section 28 of the Central Bank Act 1989 and in force immediately before the coming into operation of section 78(d) of the Central Bank (Supervision and Enforcement) Act 2013 is to be treated as continuing in effect as if given under this section and accordingly is a subsisting direction under this section for the purposes of subsection (10).

(16) The duty imposed by subsection (1) shall not apply to a relevant new credit institution until the end of the period of 3 years after it commences business in the State; but at the end of that period, the credit institution shall notify the Bank of all decisions to impose charges in relation to the provision of any service to a customer or to a group of customers during that period and of any proposal to do so which is not implemented during that period.

(17) A notification under subsection (16) shall be treated as a notification under subsection (1) for the purposes of this section; and references in this section to a proposal include a decision to impose charges notified under subsection (16).

(18) In subsection (16) ‘relevant new credit institution’ means a credit institution which commences business as a credit institution in the State after the coming into operation of section 78(d) of the Central Bank (Supervision and Enforcement) Act 2013 and is not when it does so a related undertaking (within the meaning of that Act) of another credit institution carrying on business as a credit institution in the State.”.