Consumer complaint received 2021-09-28
Company: Coinbase, Inc.
State: WI
Product: Money transfer, virtual currency, or money service
Sub-product: Virtual currency
Issue: Other service problem

Complaint:
We are not satisfied with the response from CoinBase, regarding the closure of our deceased son 's account. 
We have previously submitted a complaint with CFPB # XXXX. 

Our son, died on XX/XX/XXXX. 
On XX/XX/XXXX, the first inquiry was made to CoinBase, regarding an account that he had with them. All necessary documents ( Death Certificate, Affidavit of Domicile and Drivers ' license of personal representative ) were uploaded to their website. From his bank activity, we knew that he had made deposits and withdrawals in this CoinBase account between XX/XX/XXXX and XX/XX/XXXX. 
There was not action nor response from CoinBase to our inquiry. 
We submitted a complaint with CFPB on XX/XX/XXXX. 

We are not satisfied with the solution that CoinBase presented to us on closing our deceased son 's account and opening another account and so, we presented a complaint directly to CoinBase on XX/XX/XXXX. They had not answered our questions about the value of the account and sent us a list of transactions, all in cryptocurrency from which we were unable to ascertain value in USD. 

As legal personal representatives of the estate of our son, we should be able to get information about the account, like the value in USD ; be able to close the account ; and direct the balance of the account be paid in USD by check, to an established Estate bank account. We do understand the volatility of cryptocurrency, but needed to know a date of XXXX valuation.

Repeatedly we were told that we had to open a personal account in order to transfer the money. We are not comfortable with this, especially after CoinBase has been so lax in responding in a clear and reputable way to our request. 
We will not open a personal account with this company. My son has/had an account. Why can not his account be closed and the funds sent to his legal Estate account? It seems impossible to do this? As legal representatives of the estate, we are not the beneficiary. His XXXX son ( age XXXX  ) is the beneficiary of the Estate, but can not open an account. CoinBase replied to this and said that his legal guardian could open an account and the transfer could be made. And yet, there was no description of how they would validate that the person is the legal guardian. It seems that anyone could open an account and ask to transfer the cryptocurrency. And then, how would the account be closed and balance remitted in USD. We would certainly not be comfortable with providing a bank account of ours to receive the funds. Every other financial institution that we have had to deal with was able to provide a check in USD, made out to the Estate.
CoinBase has not been helpful. They say that they " work with trust accounts '' and yet that is not what this is. An account member died, he had no will, his estate is in probate to ascertain just what his XXXX  son may inherit.

We are trying to protect our identification, and get the money due to our grandson.

Thank you.

Company response to consumer: Closed with explanation