Consumer complaint received 2020-08-06
Company: TRUIST FINANCIAL CORPORATION
State: VA
Product: Checking or savings account
Sub-product: Checking account
Issue: Managing an account
Sub-issue: Problem using a debit or ATM card

Complaint:
I've been a BB & T customer for over six years. BB & T is now part of Truist Bank. I opened my checking and savings accounts in XXXX, XXXX XXXX and now live in XXXX, XXXX   I've spoken repeatedly to my branch banker, BB & T 's XXXX  support team, and XXXX XXXX XXXX about these issues for over five months to no avail. 

For at least three years now I and others have encountered persistent problems not just in logging in, but in accessing BB & T 's website and mobile app at all. These problems have persisted with different internet connections, on different devices, in different cities, and at all times of day. About half of my attempts to log in and access my banking information since I last spoke to my branch banker have been unsuccessful. I have screenshots of the most common errors that I can provide on request, from the website ( where I am not able to access the log-in screen most of the time, including earlier today, yesterday, and the day before that ) and the mobile app ( which I was effectively locked out of for a period of three days last week ). 

This means that, a large portion of the time, I am completely unable to access card controls or other fraud-prevention features supposedly offered by Truist. I was not able to cancel my debit card and obtain a new one until two days after I'd lost it. And Truist elected to process a {$520.00} charge on that card over a week after it had been canceled. 

I frequently can not transfer money between my two accounts. I can not, with few and rare exceptions, monitor my daily spending or note suspicious charges on my account. 

In short, Truist is selling me a product it does not provide. 

My request to my branch banker XXXX XXXX in XXXX, which I repeated to a clerk in XXXX and via email last month, that overdraft protection be removed from my checking account has not been honored. As a result of this and my inability to regularly check my account balances, I've again incurred several returned item fees of {$36.00} each. 

XXXX has not responded to my email of XX/XX/XXXX. Those I have spoken to on BB & T 's social media and on the phone help hotline have gone so far as to insult my intelligence by denying that these problems even exist ( " we are not experiencing any online banking issues '' ) even as I attempt to log in, on different devices and on different internet connections. 

I work in XXXX XXXX ; I can recognize the difference between a client-side and a server-side problem. BB & T 's servers are periodically refusing connections, sometimes to the website as a whole and sometimes only to the encrypted log-in page and/or the account view pages themselves. 

XXXX is a website that tracks website outages. It consistently, every day, has at least a handful of reports about BB & T.com nearly every hour. If others are reporting online banking issues to this specific website, I find it impossible to believe that Truist staff are not themselves aware of the problems, as they claim. Whether they are aware or not, it is their responsibility to maintain a usable website. 

To put it kindly, I find it reprehensible that Truist would continue assessing overdraft fees on its customers during a pandemic that has terminated many of their incomes. However, combined with Truist staff 's inability or unwillingness to provide a functional web interface, I feel that continuing to assess not only overdraft fees but even monthly maintenance fees is an act of fraud, or of false advertising at a bare minimum. 

I will not permit Truist both to remove the tools it claims to provide to help manage my finances, and take it on itself to " punish '' me for supposed mismanagement.

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