Consumer complaint received 2023-09-22
Company: BANK OF AMERICA, NATIONAL ASSOCIATION
State: CA
Product: Credit card
Sub-product: General-purpose credit card or charge card
Issue: Problem with a purchase shown on your statement
Sub-issue: Credit card company isn't resolving a dispute about a purchase on your statement

Complaint:
I recently established a company called " XXXX XXXX XXXX XXXX XXXX in the state of California. The company provides online pilot preparation programs for aspiring private or commercial pilots. All the courses are delivered through online live classes. Courses and classes can be chosen online and paid for through our payment gateway established by " Bank of American '' ( B of A ) bank merchant services. Our company experienced a Credit Card XXXX attack on XX/XX/2023 starting a XXXX and continued until I realized it at XXXX the same morning. I took swift action and informed my web developer to freeze our online payment system, of which he did at XXXX. The payment XXXX failed to recognize that XXXX transaction came from a single IP address in the XXXX. Also, all the stolen credit cards numbers and names had the same address, but different names and credit card numbers for each consumer. XXXX transactions failed to come through, yet XXXX did actually get through B of A 's payment gateway they helped us program into our website. Our payment portal established through B of A came with " Fraud Management '' and " Payment Acceptance Authentication '' protections. yet both were XXXX from the very beginning of account establishment. I was informed by their merchant services customer service team that these protections were never activated from the beginning. Plus, no one made us aware that we had such protections, or any guidance on setting them up. We simply relied on B of A to have had such security protocols in place through the payment XXXX itself. B of A and their merchant services team has been slow walking this since last week when they should be acting with supreme urgency to address this cyber fraud and stop it from happening throughout their 's and other bank 's merchant services systems. I have written them a few times, attempted to call them to put some urgency and attention to this, but sadly no replies or communications. I finally threatened to file complaints with any agency or government entity that can look into this. The local service rep contacting me after my threat immediately and directed me to there " Fraud Risk management '' team to get answers and resolve this major shortcoming.

The person handling my case obfuscated himself and B of A of any wrong doing or shortcomings of their payment systems. They have frozen the fraudulent funds since last Wednesday. There are now 13 chargebacks placed on my account of which are draw from my own company 's funds and not from the frozen funds of the fraudulent transactions. They state that the funds will continue to be drawn from my own account and not the frozen funds. That the frozen funds will remain frozen for 6 months or longer if needed. The amount that is frozen from the 63 fraudulent transactions is currently {$22000.00}. I only have {$30000.00} to my name and business. B of A is also charging a {$15.00} chargeback service fee for each of the 63 transactions that came through so far. Add insult to injury, my company will also be charged credit card transaction fees for all of the fraudulent charges, which comes to about another {$1200.00}. I can imagine losing my business, possibly go broke and on the street even. B of A needs to be held accountable for their actions and especially inactions to protect my company and the consumers insnared by this cyber attack. Yet they don't seem to care the least from my conversations with them. If it is business as usual for them, then imagine that these scammers may have succeeded. They will be emboldened to do this on a grand scale and broadly. Consumers that need access to credit will be harmed and in desperation. The ripple effect could be bigger than what some or B of A might think. My business will be in ruins, and another taxpayer dead to the system. Don't let this happen to a company registered here in this great state please. If not your division, please advise of any and all divisions that stand ready to take action to protect us consumers and business owners.

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