Consumer complaint received 2022-05-26
Company: JPMORGAN CHASE & CO.
State: MA
Product: Credit card or prepaid card
Sub-product: General-purpose credit card or charge card
Issue: Closing your account
Sub-issue: Company closed your account

Complaint:
Chase Bank closed a line of credit in a discriminatory way. Their policy did not allow any room for remediation and even though I first contacted them within a few days of the account having been closed ( which I did not know about until I called ), they claimed at that time that it was too late to have the account reinstated after payment in full was received. I don't have a way of requesting the percentage of applicants which have their accounts automatically closed without review after 60 days ( the account never went into collections and it is paid in full as of the end of XX/XX/XXXX ), but I have to wonder if there is some sort of discrimination of accounts taking place based on gender and ethnicity fed into their automatic credit decisions based on an algorithm. They applied their policy of closing the account due to risk without notifying me of their review process or any underlying factors of what I could do while it was taking place. They closed the account after two returned payments and while I was trying to make a large payment to pay the account in full. This resulted in lowering my credit score as a result of the account closure even though all payments prior to the two missed payments in XXXX were made on time and the account was consistently current since XXXX. I have made several good faith efforts at communicating the efforts that I went through to make payments as soon as possible given the banking system and paid in full that same month. I then understand that this is a business decision and made the case that this account, save for the unfortunate 2 months, was that of a good client who consistently paid on time and was interested in a positive and mutually beneficial relationship with Chase Bank. I spoke to a few representatives- some who were respectful, and a couple who attempted to use XXXX XXXX XXXX and another who was just direct and rude - about my request to have a risk or credit team review my whole account in full taking into account my record of payment and the fact that the policy that caused to close my account was a bank error due to the fact that their policy likely exacerbates discrimination especially if it is based on an algorithm that prejudices against XXXX women. Again, I don't have the statistics on what proportion of accounts held by XXXX women are closed after 60 days versus other unprotected classes, but the way that I was prevented from having any conversation outside of the customer service department and their " escalation '' customer service member ( all of whom informed me they did not have the authority to reopen this account that has been recently closed ) without referring me to a team or submitting an application or a dispute to a team that DID have the authority to review its credit/risk decisions suggests to me that they never intended on taking my inquiry seriously. I have gone to lengths to keep this account current and in good standing despite working on a degree while holding a full time job, changing jobs, and having to withdraw- with tax penalties - from my 401 ( k ) for living expenses and to pay off this credit card in full in order to maintain good credit. Chase Bank has now ruined my credit score AND has been paid in full without the account ever going to collections and having all of their interest paid. 

All of our correspondence thus far has occurred via telephone calls that are recorded by Chase Bank, so I do not have any documents and do not have access to their algorithm or automatic decision-making process. I was told over the phone that there is no human review process for these risk decisions and no human who would review the account for re-opening, they are just made automatically according to policy. They also stated that they would make a note of a complaint but that there would not be a review. They also informed me over the phone that there is no requirement to notify the customer. ( Indeed, they did not notify me. In fact, I found out about the action when I called to make a payment since they had restricted my ability to pay in the usual ways ).

Company response to consumer: Closed with explanation