Consumer complaint received 2020-03-25
Company: WELLS FARGO & COMPANY
State: IA
Product: Credit card or prepaid card
Sub-product: General-purpose credit card or charge card
Issue: Fees or interest
Sub-issue: Problem with fees

Complaint:
Today, on XX/XX/XXXX I accessed my online account to pay my credit card balance and I noticed a recent charge, which stood out to me since I haven't utilized the card for weeks while self-quarantining for Covid-19. It was a " Rewards Annual Membership Fee. '' I didn't recognize this charge so I tried to access the information about where it came from, but no details were provided on the link -- which is not typical. Most vendors provide a phone number at the very minimum. Suspecting fraud I called card services right away. When I asked the representative to find me a contact number for that entity he laughed and said that it was Wells Fargo. This was the first time I heard of any Rewards associated with this credit card. This representative told me that he had to 'erase ' all of the points that he said I had earned ( apparently 13K+ ), stating that it was the only way that he could proceed in resolving this dispute as he couldn't get past that window without me agreeing to let him delete the points. I told him that I was fine with that so long as all charges, current and past, were credited back to me. I then asked him to go back and see how many times over the past several years I had been charged. After waiting on hold he returned to the line and said that there had been no previous charges. By this point I had started going through my tax files and found statements from XXXX and XXXX, each showing a {$50.00} awards membership charge. He then transferred me to someone in " customer care. '' This person started the conversation by saying that I had accessed my rewards. I informed her that this was definitely not the case as I had no knowledge of said rewards until today and that the only person who accessed them was the representative I had first spoken to who deleted all of the points. 

I spent an hour and a half trying to get this issue resolved. At the time that I opened this account there was no mention of any rewards program or any annual fee associated with this account. It may have been hidden somewhere in the fine print, but I guarantee you that as part of the conversation with the banker I would have insisted on reassurance that there were no annual fees associated with the card. This credit card was going to be dedicated to a small business with low volume purchases ( low reward opportunity ) and I would NEVER have agreed to pay an annual fee -- nor would I have failed to ask if there was an annual fee for the card. I have great credit and I can obtain a credit card from any company that I want -- I would NOT have agreed to a fee. I'm submitting this complaint because it seems reasonable to assume that I'm not the only person who has experienced this problem. All in all it appears that at the very minimum they've fraudulently charged my account {$200.00}. I am insisting on FULL reimbursement for every charge, seeing as I've never accessed said rewards and had no knowledge until today of said rewards. I'm told that my case ( # XXXX ) has been moved up to " Case Management '' at Wells Fargo. They gave me a direct access number of XXXX. Though I have been verbally assured that the most recent charge of {$50.00} has been removed, there is not evidence of this credit on my online account as of yet.

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 monetary relief