Consumer complaint received 2018-07-15
Company: CITIBANK, N.A.
State: WA
Product: Checking or savings account
Sub-product: Checking account
Issue: Problem caused by your funds being low
Sub-issue: Non-sufficient funds and associated fees

Complaint:
I've had significant issues with Citibank over the last couple of years. At first, I was enthralled with the idea that Citibank was a great, reputable bank that was worldwide. However, I soon came to find out that not only are they one of the worst banks, but they will do anything and everything they can to not protect the customer and not rectify their wrongdoings. Citibank has created an enormous financial burden for me over the years. The main issues stem from XXXX, when the identity theft first started. After a robbery in XXXX, crooks stole my credit card information, social security number, passport, drivers license, bank and routing account information and all applicable security data that was stored in my XXXX. I suffered through about {$80000.00} worth of fraud across 9 credit cards and Citibank. I was in the hospital for months after the attack, and the crooks kept charging the credit cards and the cards were linked to autopay on my Citibank account and getting sucked out monthly. The crooks took my debit card as well and they emptied everything out. I ended up with nearly {$2000.00} worth of returned check fees. Citibank never contacted me to think anything was suspicious until I logged in and noticed what was happening. Long story short, everyone had my back -- XXXX XXXX, XXXX, XXXX -- everyone but Citibank, my own personal bank. I had a near 800 credit score before all of this happened and paid my bills in full every month, and never had insufficient funds nor do I even have overdraft turned on. I filed police reports, identity theft reports, and spent months working with investigators doing everything they asked me. Citibank laughed in my face and said " too bad. '' I had to move to XXXX State and there are no Citibanks in the XXXX XXXX, so I had to sit on the phone for hours at a time getting outsourced to the XXXX and places in XXXX where they barely speak English or know what is going on. I got handed around again and again and again with no form of resolution. Finally, I went to my own personal banker where I opened my checking account, the branch manager in  XXXX, XXXX named XXXX XXXX and she was horrified by what Citibank was doing. She tried further disputing everything and getting my money back, but could not. Keep in mind, this happened in XX/XX/XXXX-early XX/XX/XXXX and took years to settle. I was recommended to contact the CFPB to let them know what was happening. Citibank, the bank portion, ended up making things right ( for the most part ) but they only returned the money that was taken from me. I didn't get any other " bonuses '' or compensation for my time spent on the matter. I ended up filing a lawsuit against Citibank Credit Cards for all the fraud that was on one of the credit cards. I worked with XXXX XXXX, who was a lawyer for Citibank, who apologized and removed the card from my profile after reviewing everything I sent her. Because of that one Citibank card, my credit went down from nearly 800 to XXXX. After it was taken off, my credit was rectified to what it originally was ( near 800 ) but still, the trauma that results from these financial issues is unacceptable. You can't rent an apartment, get a new credit card, open a new bank account or do anything. If someone was actually responsible for defaulting on that, then thats understandable, but not for fraud when I have police reports, photos and news articles detailing what happened. 

So that was prior. Now onto the current issue I am having with Citibank. I ended up enlisting in the military in XX/XX/XXXX. I left for XXXX and came back to XXXX in XX/XX/XXXX. When I came back, I noticed some fraudulent charges on my account from the time I was XXXX. I went in to the XXXX XXXX Citibank # XXXX on XX/XX/XXXX and spoke to XXXX XXXX, a personal banker, NMLS : XXXX, who took all of my information and details and said she was going to work on resolving this as soon as possible. I told her I was on my 7 days of military leave and would be XXXX again. She said she would do everything in her power to rectify things. 

Fast forward to XX/XX/XXXX, I have no access to my phone abroad nor Internet. I had been gone for over 3 months now and was on another 7 days of leave. I left XXXX XXXX a message to see if everything was fixed but did not hear back. On my last day of leave I called the branch again, and they told me that XXXX XXXX left within 2 weeks of me visiting that branch in XXXX. So once again, Citibank just didnt seem to care and left me in distress. 

I XXXX once again. I came back in XX/XX/XXXX. I had 2 weeks of leave this time so I had more time to check on everything. I was shocked that this was happening once again. From XX/XX/XXXX - XX/XX/XXXX there was over {$25000.00} of fraud on the account. For someone in the military, that is A LOT of money that got sucked out. I kept money in that account for two reasons : one for autopay for my XXXX XXXX cards, which are authorized for my family members to use the XXXX cards and XXXX is authorized to take that out of the account ; two is for my monthly car loan that I authorize XXXX to debit from my account so my family can have a car to drive while I am away. That is it. They do not have access to my bank account and I expected security measures to greatly increase after what has happened previously.

I went into a branch in XXXX XXXX, XXXX in early XX/XX/XXXX. I was furious and went to a personal banker and highlighted every single charge that was fraudulent -- every charge that wasn't from XXXX or XXXX from XX/XX/XXXX - XX/XX/XXXX. He said he would take care of it as soon as possible, I didn't know whether or not to shut down the account because I only have Citibank and a military bank account and I still had money flowing into the Citibank account from direct deposits, etc. I believe that he blocked it. 

However, during the 30 days, Citibank refused to issue any provisional credit for a majority of the charges. So they were personally holding {$25000.00} of my money until the " investigation '' finished. That's absurd. People can die from that. That is A LOT of money for some people. How else am I going to pay the rent, food on the table, etc? Citibank laughed and thought it was a joke again. I returned for training in the XXXX XXXX and there was no Citibanks there. I was gearing up to go for XXXX again and now Im traumatized by the way Citibank was handling the situation, and my lack of finances in my account that I worked for! 

I was told I was going overseas again, but we were going to the east coast prior. I went into a bank on my day off and barely missed the closing time on XX/XX/XXXX. I met with Mr. XXXX XXXX, NMLS ID XXXX, and I was there for almost two hours talking to him and the fraud team. As it turns out, the fraud team missed thousands of dollars worth of transactions that were highlighted. Mr. XXXX agreed that I should take this up with the CFPB once again and possibly file another lawsuit, and he vouched to help me get this settled. We spoke to the fraud team and one of the supervisors named " XXXX '' with code ( XXXX ) said that many of the transactions were ruled in my favor ( of course ) but some ATM transactions were not and that I can appeal these ( which I am doing now ). She also promised to help get everything sorted and apologized for the inconvenience Ive had with Citibank. I gave XXXX permission to work with Mr. XXXX and discuss any and all applicable information necessary for this case. Our call ended with XXXX at XXXX EST. 

The following week or so, Mr. XXXX confirmed some transactions were permanently given back to me such as from a merchant named " XXXX '' where a bulk of the money was getting laundered to. 

There was good news for a while, and I wanted to close this Citibank account and have just a more secure military checking account because Ive had way too many issues with Citibank. However, down the line, I started getting calls from XXXX that my autopay for my car loan wouldn't go through. I got worried and checked my bank account with XXXX -- I had a significant negative balance. XXXX had confirmed to me that all of the transactions were getting processed to getting permanently credited, so this was concerning. 

I logged into my Citibank account and found that they sent me at least 10 different messages ruling in my favor. 

From the looks of everything, the largest of the transactions that left my account were through " XXXX. '' Citibank ruled in my favor issuing permanent credit for a few of these transactions, but then sucked the money back out of my account. How is it that only some of these transactions are fraudulent but others aren't? This sounds exactly like the same predicament as XXXX! EXACTLY THE SAME. IT DOESN'T MAKE SENSE. 

This is the email I sent to Mr. XXXX in regards to finding that : XXXX Hi Sir, So its getting further complicated now. Im not sure what the issue is but they credited me roughly another {$1000.00} on XX/XX/XXXX. They said they were honoring almost everything and then today I got a notification that they sucked {$8300.00} out of my account without any notification, etc. Can you please look into this? Im so tired and stressed out from Citibank Im waiting til everything is finished to file suit.

So just based off the last email sir, I went into my account and it looks like an error on Citibanks behalf ( again ). 

On the XXXX they sucked $ 8,000+ out of my account but I checked all the letters from the entire month of XXXX and they said nothing of this. They said they were honoring a majority of the requests aside from the ATM transactions and the transactions involving a cardholder signature, which I was going to file in my complaint with the FCC. 

But looking at the letters shown, and the one on XX/XX/XXXX in particular, they found the transactions from XX/XX/XXXX {$2500.00} XXXX, {$2000.00} XX/XX/XXXX Coinbase XX/XX/XXXX XXXX clearing all to be in my favor. It says that these credits are now considered permanent. But on XX/XX/XXXX they just debited my accounts for THESE same transactions! How does that make sense? I have everything in writing from Citibank itself saying the credits are permanent. 

Furthermore, aside from those 3 credits that were debited again on XXXX, theres two more! One for  {$2400.00} and {$1000.00} both from XXXX! So how are only some of these transactions from coinbase considered in my favor and some not? How does any of this make sense! This is why I sued them last year! They dont know what they are doing. 

Please help me in resolving this case sir, I appreciate your time handling it thus far. 

Thank you. 

Mr. XXXX apologized for this, and asked to see the letters from Citibank saying that these credits were considered permanent. I sent the most recent 7 letters I could find, its all in writing Citibank! Its verified by multiple people on recorded lines and its literally in writing. Theres police reports, evidence, everything is there. Its not fair what you are doing to your customer and its not fair that its so hard to contact Citibank while youre in the military and monitor all of this. Who has the time, energy and effort to deal with all of this? When you bank with someone, you are literally entrusting them with your life savings, your will, benefits for your family, etc. You dont do this to people! Its not right! Please have a top Citibank CEO or employee get back to me, or have someone contact me to rectify this situation. Otherwise, I really have no issue filing another court case in regards to this. Its a shame that is what has to be done, but its just absurd to even think about. This letter alone to CFPB took 3 hours to construct. If I had to calculate the number of hours just dealing with the issues Ive had to personally deal with Citibank it would be 800+ hours. This just shows how Citibank doesnt care about members of the armed forces serving XXXX XXXX. I come home with enough XXXX and XXXX from abroad just to get these friendly greetings from Citibank. Factoring in the XXXX XXXX, XXXX XXXX and financial impacts of what Citibank has done to my family, and me its really priceless and thats something they will definitely consider in civil court a lot more than the {$25000.00} taken from me! 

To make matters worse, Mr. XXXX told me that XXXX no longer works for Citibank and so shes gone. It took hours to explain my situation to her and then she disappears and Im expected to call the fraud department and discuss my case again? Seriously? How many times does this keep happening? Then Mr. XXXX sent me another message saying his last day at the Citibank branch was on XX/XX/XXXX because he has decided to move back to XXXX. Are you kidding? These are the employees Im entrusting and its just like a vicious cycle to the consumer and the customer. Its not a good look to see this high of a turnover rate at Citibank and just look at the way its affecting your customers! 

Please rectify this situation Citibank.

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