Consumer complaint received 2023-10-07
Company: BANK OF AMERICA, NATIONAL ASSOCIATION
State: NV
Product: Money transfer, virtual currency, or money service
Sub-product: Domestic (US) money transfer
Issue: Fraud or scam

Complaint:
My family and I have been scammed by this online car auction site based out of XXXX XXXX, Iowa called XXXX XXXX XXXX 

When we found their website in our search for a vehicle, they claimed to have been in business since XXXX yet they have zero reviews or testimonials that I could find, save for a couple very old forums that left positive reviews. The Iowa Attorney General shows no such company in their database but they also showed 0 complaints as well. No listing was found in XXXX when we first started dealing with them. 

The way their 'site ' works is by claiming to be a repossession company - online auction for cars, boats, RVs. I won a XXXX XXXX XXXX XXXX ( along with a few others we bid on ) and the site sent us a winning bid notification after blowing up my phone with calls, all from the same woman 's voice. Her voice is also the same voice on the answering service, which we didn't hear until later when we were trying to get hold of them. ( They even have you create an account on their website and submit your drivers license to be able to bid on the auctions. As far as scams go, its pretty sophisticated. ) They then sent us a bill of lading after the transfer and said they handle shipping and that the cars are sent out by their own staff over the phone. After we sent the wire to the account and address on the invoice, the company then sent a follow-up email confirming receipt & shipping confirmation, with expected delivery date : Friday, XX/XX/XXXX, between XXXX XXXX - XXXX. By this time, I googled the company one more time because the paperwork looked a bit suspicious and found this forum post not even 24 hours old at the time XXXX XXXX XXXX XXXX You will see others now finding out about this recent scam as well. ( And that we'd sent a {$50000.00} wire for another car we'd " won '' that I was luckily able to cancel because I'd scheduled it for later the next week. ) We played phone tag with this scammer woman and I now know based on on-line forums that this company had also scammed other people that same week and can now confirm no one who participated in the auction received their respective vehicles. We managed to get hold of her one more time when the car no-showed on the XXXX and she started to say that the car was no longer available and that there was a " problem ''. SURE. The problem was that she was a scammer! She had the audacity to say that they hadn't received the {$50000.00} either for the other car. She then began to say that they would send " another '' car in place of the XXXX ( obviously buying more time,. there was no other car ), but we cut her off and said we weren't interested and to return the funds. 

She then said that the funds would be refunded, and this is a direct quote from her email : " Dear _____, Please note that we have registered your request, and your refund proceeds will start on Monday, XX/XX/XXXX, and your payment will be fully refunded in XXXX hours to the same account from which the transfer was sent. 

Sincerely, XXXX, XXXX XXXX ( XXXX ) XXXX Monday to Friday - XXXX XXXX - XXXX XXXX  '' It's now Friday, XX/XX/XXXX, and of course no funds have been returned and our follow up emails have been ignored. 

I had filed a case with my bank but they said that because we initiated the wire transfer it's our fault and they won't cover it. And Bank of America, the bank that received the funds, will not return them. I would like to file a complaint against Bank of America for protecting scammers and keeping our hard-earned funds instead of returning them.

Company public response: Company has responded to the consumer and the CFPB and chooses not to provide a public response
Company response to consumer: Closed with explanation