Consumer complaint received 2019-05-21
Company: UNITED SERVICES AUTOMOBILE ASSOCIATION
State: FL
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:
As a 30+ year USAA member, military veteran, and XXXX XXXX   XXXX with US Fortune 500 company experience, I have seen a rapid decline in corporate integrity and the quality of customer service over the last few years with USAA . There has been an increasingly more regular mistreatment of its members, which has been confirmed through many discussions with several other veterans and active duty service members. 

I and many other veterans have begun the process of shutting down all of our USAA accounts and business relationships over the past year, with the ultimate goal of a complete exit from the company. Those of us with children who have decided to also serve in the military are strongly advising them to avoid USAA and to tell all of their peers in the military to do the same. 

This latest episode with USAA is by far, the most disgraceful and highly unprofessional handling of a case I have seen to date, and has promoted us to pursue legal options and explore recovery of damages. 

1. USAA, through an obviously incompetent security screening process, allowed an identity thief to use my mothers social security number to open a fraudulent checking account. This is just the latest in a long series of financial security issues I have experienced with USAA over the past five years, each of which cost me tens of hours of my time and the time of many other businesses to correct. My mother is not even a USAA member. 

2. This security breach which was allowed by USAA has affected my ability to open joint banking accounts with my mother and other family members. An account I attempted to open was shut down ( document attached ). 

3. USAA has slandered and defamed our character by falsely reporting information about my mothers financial history. USAA did this by knowing and admitting that the banking activity background check service called XXXX XXXX publishes data which is very vague and ambiguous about checking account irregularities. My mother is a victim of identity theft, ( caused by USAAs incompetence ) however, USAA sent information to XXXX XXXX which allowed them to re-characterize her activity as criminal. USAA had knowledge that XXXX XXXX would do this, and allowed it to happen. 

4. The failures described above could have been easily handled in an acceptable manner by USAA, but instead, our entire family has been put through a living XXXX the past three weeks, since USAA has refused to correct the situation. 

5. After my parents and I being shuffled through many different customer service representatives, many unreturned phone calls, and being handed off from one department to the next, to the next, we finally ended up in the CEOs resolution center, which just chose to shuffle us off to another office to handle the problem, resulting in another extended delay as USAA reviews our request. We have collectively spent a total of about 6 hours on the phone with USAA trying to solve this. 

6. We have simply requested a letter from USAA proving that my mother is an identity theft victim, and not a criminal, and a copy of the document which was sent from USAA to XXXX XXXX. 

7. Meanwhile, we have been told by XXXX XXXX at extension XXXX in the fraud/security department, that although he and others at USAA have stated my mother has done nothing wrong, and is a victim, USAA did everything correctly and they will not be supplying us documentation to exonerate my mother and to prove that she is not an identity theft criminal. XXXX basically told us it is not USAAs problem, and dumped it in our lap to figure out. 

We will be pursuing ( vs. exploring ) formal legal action, and will follow up with outreach and a warning to many veterans organizations if USAA does not immediately take responsibility for their failure and do the right thing by supplying the requested documents. A formal complaint with the Federal Consumer Finance Protection Bureau ( CFPB ) is also pending. 

No one should ever be treated the way we have been treated. 

I strongly urge my fellow veterans who may be reading this to immediately spread the word as fast as possible and to inundate USAA with CFPB complaints for all qualifying financial irregularities they have experienced with USAA. Maybe there is some hope USAA will take notice and return to the company it once was, proudly serving veterans, active duty service members, and their families. Sadly, it appears this is no longer true. 

*** request *** Immediately supply two documents : 1. A letter signed by XXXX XXXX ( full name requested on the letter ), Manager of the XXXX XXXX XXXX, on USAA letterhead, formally stating that my mother is a victim of identity theft with USAA, and is not guilty of any wrongdoing. 

2. A copy of the communication which was sent from USAA to the XXXX XXXX company regarding my mothers status.

Company public response: Company believes it acted appropriately as authorized by contract or law
Company response to consumer: Closed with explanation