Consumer complaint received 2023-01-26
Company: Paypal Holdings, Inc
State: FL
Product: Checking or savings account
Sub-product: Checking account
Issue: Managing an account
Sub-issue: Problem accessing account

Complaint:
On XX/XX/2023 I contacted Venmo to report several unauthorized transactions. I was in the hospital and someone had gotten a hold of my Venmo card and tablet, which had the Venmo app installed. They took over {$350.00}. Venmo quickly XXXX the card, froze the account, and proceeded to recover all of the money that was taken from me. 

Unfortunately, they never did unfreeze the account, despite every on my part to provide them with the information they requested, at least twice, in many case, multiple times. 

I was XXXX from the hospital  on XX/XX/XXXX, at which time my account was still frozen. That money was needed to cover my rent and the administrative fees of an appeal. As a result of not having access to those funds, I became homeless and at risk of losing my appeal due to non-payment. 

I wasn't able to sleep for XXXX  days because I had nowhere to go. I sat in a XXXX XXXX  at night to stay warm. I couldn't work because I was too busy trying to find a place to sleep. As I said, I just got out of the hospital, where I had been for XXXX  weeks with XXXX  and XXXX, so you hopefully see why staying outside all night wasn't an option. That, and I'm a woman. 

I told Venmo every single day what I was going through because they weren't release my funds, but it did not seem to matter to the people who handled the freezing of an account. Every single day they would ask for something else, and it usually something I had already given them, such as my ID, Part of the problem is that you can't speak to the group that handles this directly, nor can customer service agents who do talk to customers. You have to wait for them to contact you. That was bad enough, but then it was always someone different, and it didn't appear that they went back and read the history to see that they asking for something that I had provided. 

To demonstrate how ridiculous this has become, they told me that my account was unfrozen so I tried to transfer some of the money out, but I got the same error I was getting before. So I tried to add another debit card to see if it would work with that, but it didn't. The next day the latest Venmo person in that department contacted me and said that I had provide XXXX months worth of bank statements that included the last XXXX  of the card I just tired to add. I had already provided the statement for this account and I didn't have XXXX months worth, I had just opened this account in XXXX. Finally, none of my banks put debit card numbers on their statements. The customer service agent told me that he wasn't telling me to send a picture of my debit card that shows the bank and the last digits of the card. That's exactly what he was telling me to do, and I did that too. 

The next day I tried to do a bank transfer, based on what they told me. They said that instant transfers didn't always work and I should try the bank transfer. But it failed too, and once again they're asking for a statement from that bank. 

I provided the statement but now it's saying my account has been suspended. 

I did everything they asked me to do, multiple times in many cases, I don't understand why they didn't unfreeze my account or why my account would now be suspended when I was only doing what they instructed me to do. 

I've been homeless and unemployed since XX/XX/2023. 

I had no problem with them freezing my account at first, but there's no reason it should have taken as long as it has. If they would have just provided me with a list of things that they needed the first time around, I would have provided them.

Company response to consumer: Closed with non-monetary relief