Consumer complaint received 2021-03-26
Company: U.S. BANCORP
State: CA
Product: Credit card or prepaid card
Sub-product: General-purpose credit card or charge card
Issue: Closing your account
Sub-issue: Company closed your account

Complaint:
I am writing to ask you to institute litigation against US Bank to force them to stop engaging in a deceptive practice, which enriches them and defrauds numerous consumers.

US Bank CSRs ( Customer Service Representatives ) are trained to tell customers that they can buy gift cards using the XXXX Altitude card, without fear of having their accounts shut down or other adverse actions. 
In fact, this advice is not true. 
US Bank shut down my account for that reason, and, according to media reports, their officials freely admit that it is their policy to shut down accounts fo this reason. 
By training CSRs to tell consumers that there is no problem, US Bank acquires more market share, by closing the accounts, they avoid making large payments on gift card purchases at XXXX XXXX stores using XXXX XXXX  and other similar wallets. 
Such payments get XXXX  % back, redeemable for travel at XXXX XXXX %. 
I understand large companies move slowly, so I have given US Bank several years to correct this fraudulent practice. 
However, they have not. 
The following are tape recorded conversations where US Bank trained CSRs told me that there is no risk at all of an account shutdown for buying very large amounts of gift cards : XX/XX/XXXX XXXX XXXX XXXX  XXXX call center ( sp? ) " altitude cards will absolutely not be closed due to buying gift cards '' XXXX XXXX XXXX XXXX de XXXX XXXX if you buy several thousand in Gift Cards, your XXXX  Altitude will absolutely not be closed '' XX/XX/XXXX XXXX XXXX XXXX absolutelyutely sure Altitude card will not be closed for buying large amounts of gift cards '' There are several others which I did not take notes on, but where the message was the same.

But, don't take my word for it, call any CSR and see if they tell you the same thing.

I reported this problem to several US Bank representatives one several years.

No corrective action was taken, which is ironic for a bank whose ads prominently feature them being named one of the world 's most ethical banks.

One of the representatives I reported this to was XXXX, at XXXX XXXX XXXX XXXX. 
I believe a fair resolution of this would be for US Bank to offer to reopen all XXXX  cards cards closed for buying large amounts ts of gift cards, and to document to the CFPB that they have instituted a training program to avoid their CSRs misinforming consumers in the future.

The issue is not whether US Bank has a right to close any card for any reason ( which they do ), the issue is whether they are4 allowed by the CFPB to profit from training employees to give an attractive but untrue message to consumers.

I am going to hold off on contacting a lawyer to pursue a class action, until I see if the CFPB chooses to allow US Bank to continue with this deceptive practice.

Please feel free to contact me for further information, including the specifics of my closed account. 
XXXX XXXX XXXX XXXX XXXX XXXX XXXX

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