Consumer complaint received 2022-07-13
Company: SYNCHRONY FINANCIAL
State: LA
Product: Credit reporting, credit repair services, or other personal consumer reports
Sub-product: Credit reporting
Issue: Problem with a credit reporting company's investigation into an existing problem
Sub-issue: Their investigation did not fix an error on your report

Complaint:
I was making a purchase at Banana Republic Factory in XXXX, Louisiana on XX/XX/21. The Sales Representative suggested using my existing Banana Republic credit card in order to earn rewards points. I opted to use my personal general credit card. The Sales Rep persisted in using my XXXX card, so in order to finish the transaction I used my XXXX card. The system did not receive/invalidated the card. I then countered to again just use my general credit card. The Sales Rep kept insisting, and had me call Synchrony Bank ( operating the XXXX credit cards at that time ) in order to verify my XXXX cards validity. The Bank confirmed my card was valid. After trying to swipe/tap my XXXX card again, it declined. The Sales Rep then came up with the reason that XXXX was switching banks and that affected my cards validity. She insisted that she can assist in locating my XXXX account to charge the purchase. At this time I insisted again to use my personal general card. She insisted it will take only a few minutes. After a few moments, she asked me to provide my personal information into the system she was using to locate my information. I asked to confirm that she is locating my existing card, and that this action will not affect my credit report. She said no. I asked 2 more times as she continued to verify my information that this action will not show up on my credit report. She said no. Finally, she called the bank in order for me to verify my Social Security Number, and I asked the phone representative that they are able to see that I already have an existing card and that this is the same account I am trying to access for this transaction. Phone rep said yes. After I confirmed the final piece of information with the phone rep, I was congratulated for my new account. At this point I realized they ( Banana Republic under Synchrony Bank ) opened a completely different account/card under my information. The Sales Rep was dumbfounded as I repeated the confirmation that a new credit card account was indeed opened on my behalf without my consent. I ordered the phone rep to cancel the transaction, but she said she could not and will need to just close the account. At that point, that was my only choice. The Sales Rep did not take responsibility and blamed the training team/material for the grave mistake. I repeated that is why I asked multiple times if this would reflect on my credit report, as well as using my existing personal credit card. Now I had both a hard inquiry and closed account inaccurately recorded in my credit report. 

I have attempted to file this incident with XXXX, XXXX, and XXXX. They conducted investigations that all lead to confirming the incident as a valid transaction and have recorded the opening and closing of a second Banana Republic credit card that I did not authorized and was defrauded by the company to open.

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 non-monetary relief