Consumer complaint received 2021-10-19
Company: PNC Bank N.A.
State: IL
Product: Checking or savings account
Sub-product: Checking account
Issue: Managing an account
Sub-issue: Banking errors

Complaint:
I was previously a BBVA USA Customer, which was recently bought by and merged with PNC Bank. In XX/XX/XXXX, my bank account with BBVA was closed for fraud activity after someone attempted to write stolen checks off it. A new account was opened simultaneously. This all occurred after BBVA was acquired by PNC, but before account conversion. 

In early XX/XX/XXXX, PNC mailed a welcome letter to BBVA customers that included the new routing and account numbers. I updated the direct deposit details for my employer right away to ensure there would be no delays. On Tuesday, XX/XX/XXXX, the day BBVA customers were able to access their new PNC Bank accounts online, I saw there were two open accounts : one to replace my closed BBVA account and one to replace the new BBVA account. I also noticed that the PNC account number that replaced the closed BBVA account was the only number given in the welcome letter from PNC. I thought this peculiar, but I double checked the letter from PNC to confirm that was indeed the account number they provided for direct deposits, and it was. 

The welcome letter gave assurance that there would be no interruptions to direct deposits, even if I did not provide my employer the new account number. Based on a previous experience the weekend of the conversion, I was aware that calling customer service would mean very lengthy wait times. Taking these facts into consideration, I decided against calling PNC at that time. It seemed implausible they would have provided me a closed account number in the welcome letter. And even if the account were indeed closed, surely someone would notice their mistake and re-route the deposit or at least attempt to contact me. 

Come Friday morning, XX/XX/XXXX, my deposit was not in my account and I was on the phone by XXXX, four minutes after the customer service center opened. After holding for well over an hour, the agent who assisted was unable to locate the deposit AT ALL, let alone in either of my accounts, even with all the relevant details. The agent entered an escalation ticket and told me someone would be in touch with me within 24 hours. I continued calling throughout the day, hoping to reach someone competent who would be able to help me or at least direct me to the exceptions department. After speaking with at least five agents, by the end of the day not a single person was able to locate the deposit or give me any answers whatsoever.

One person did attempt to route me to the exceptions team. I was told by them that they do not take calls from customers and that the agent should have contacted them on my behalf rather than routing my call to them. Then they hung up on me. 

At about XXXX local time on Saturday XX/XX/XXXX, I got a voicemail from XXXX XXXX on the escalation team. I returned the call by XXXX and left a voicemail. Her voicemail greeting states that she will return all calls within 24 hours. I called four more times throughout the day hoping to reach her. I also called customer service hoping someone else may be able to reach her or someone on her team internally, but again got nothing. I did not hear back from her finally until XXXX local time on Monday XX/XX/XXXX. 

At this time she disclosed that the deposit went to the exceptions team, but because the account it was routed to currently has a fraud hold there is no way for them to re-route the deposit. Under normal circumstances, she could submit a request to release the hold within 24 hours, but that department is currently advising a week long turn around time so it would be pointless. In the end, there was nothing that could be done but wait for my employer to get the returned deposit and reissue the payment again, which won't happen until Friday XX/XX/XXXX. 

There was no attempt made to make things right at all. I asked repeatedly for some sort of temporary credit so I could at least get food, but was refused. This is all completely unacceptable. PNC dropped the ball multiple times and is making no effort to correct.

Company response to consumer: Closed with explanation