Consumer complaint received 2019-08-01
Company: BANK OF AMERICA, NATIONAL ASSOCIATION
State: TX
Product: Checking or savings account
Sub-product: CD (Certificate of Deposit)
Issue: Managing an account
Sub-issue: Funds not handled or disbursed as instructed

Complaint:
This is related to an inherited IRA at Bank of America. The deceased 's name is XXXX XXXX, the IRA account # is XXXX XXXX XXXX XXXX. I am listed as the beneficiary and have provided all required documentation to have the funds dispersed to an Inherited IRA that has been opened for the purpose. 

My Mom passed away last XXXX, leaving multiple BOA accounts. There were 3 types of accounts. 

First were accounts that I was also on that transferred to my control within just a few days after providing the certificate of death. 

Next were a couple of accounts that did not have anyone else listed and did not have a named beneficiary. We obtained a court order based on the Will addressing those specific accounts and provided the order, along with all other requested documentation through a BOA Branch in XXXX TX. The Branch faxed the document package to BOA 's Estate Department for processing on XX/XX/XXXX. It took until XXXX, XXXX to have those accounts disbursed after months of back and forth to provide additional copies of specific documents that were all provided with the initial document package submitted. 

The last remaining account is the IRA that lists me as beneficiary and is not covered by the court order. The request for those funds to be dispersed was initially filed with the document package from XX/XX/XXXX. Since we were having so many problems with BOA on the accounts covered by the court order and until those accounts were being distributed I didn't push this account collection until after the other funds were disbursed. After the XXXX disbursement of the accounts covered by the court order I began to try to get the IRA transferred under the beneficiary designation. Initially I was told that the Estate Department no longer handled the IRA 's and was referred to the bank 's IRA department. They were able to walk me through setting up the IRA inheritance account to accept the funds into and assured me that the transfer would occur within a few days and assured me I was the only beneficiary listed on the account. When I received the first quarterly statement on the new IRA, I also received the quarterly statement on my Mom 's IRA. They only transferred a small portion of the funds instead of the entire balance. The majority of the funds remain in my deceased mother 's IRA. I called the IRA department and was told that they don't handle it anymore that the Estate department now handles it again. They said that I would have a personal representative to take care of me through the process and they were going to have them call me. XXXX called a few days later and again told me that he would be my personal contact and would walk me through it since they according to him have been having massive complaints on handling this type of issue. The next call with XXXX revealed that he would be passing me off to someone else since it is an IRA. The new contact was supposed to call me back but I have not heard from them. I asked XXXX if I could escalate it since it has been over a year since I originally filed to have the funds disbursed. He said no. Then I asked if I could speak to a supervisor and he said he could have the supervisor ( XXXX XXXX ) call me the next day. I have not received a call from him and my attempts to call him and XXXX just resulted in me leaving voice mail messages. 

My complaint is two-fold - First is the amount of time and effort involved in getting BOA to disburse funds from the accounts my Mom had with them was ridiculous. I would not be surprised to find out that it is a systemic issue where they have built their processes for the purpose of delaying disbursement of funds so the bank can continue to hold the deposits and make money from investing them. If they treat everyone the way they have treated us, they are unlawfully keeping people from accessing their funds for extended periods of time and if people are not persistent in pursuing the funds they will keep them until they have to escheat them to the State. They never once reached out to us to request anything they claimed they needed and they refused to let us talk to the " legal '' department that was supposedly holding up the claim. 

Second, The bank continues to hold funds that should have been disbursed to me and my request is that they immediately transfer the remaining funds from my Mom 's IRA account to the inherited IRA account they had me set up for the purpose. 

I have been more than patient in working with BOA on this and feel that without Regulatory intervention it is likely to go on for many more months. 

All relative documentation is on file with BOA 's Estate Department.

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