Consumer complaint received 2021-08-20
Company: WELLS FARGO & COMPANY
Product: Checking or savings account
Sub-product: Checking account
Issue: Closing an account
Sub-issue: Company closed your account

Complaint:
This complaint is about Wells Fargo. 
Wells currently describes this complaint as case ID XXXX I've been wrangling with them over this for three and a half years. 

Wells likely delayed a deposit, closed an account, charged fees, reopened the account, accept a deposit, then closed the account again. They also charged penalty fees and kept the positive XXXX balance for these last three and a half years, while telling me they could not send a check to XXXX. 

This is not my interpretation ; all of this is demonstrable fact. I have the time stamp confirmation from the airlines that made the deposit, and I have a recording of one Wells call center employee ( XXXX ) admitting that Wells closed, opened, took a deposit, and closed the account again. 

This left me unbanked, stranded in a foreign airport, and detained for a day on suspicion of fraud. At the time I called Wells in a panic, and they assured me they'd call me back in 24 hours. I have that call recorded, too. No call ever came. Then I had to do some real tap dancing to get out of the airport without being XXXX  for attempted fraud.

I have recorded over 30 calls, most are polite but helpless, but some include outright lies. And many emails later, also recorded, and also containing outright lies .... many " escalations '' to " executive levels '' and three years and a half later I got the attached notice that paints me as the deadbeat. 

While the enclosed seems reasonable on a first read, the mendacity of it is great. 
Like a defense attorney who has not done her homework, she peppers me with jargon, distractions and irrelevant details while avoiding the central complaint where her company is culpable. 

Devoting only two sentences to the central issue, it calls the kept balance ( for three and a half years ) " my overpayment and wants to resolve this with a mailed check for the kept amount and no bank account. No. 

Here 's the quote : " Our records show the overpayment refund in the amount of XXXX which was sent on XX/XX/2018 is still outstanding. We have requested a new check of XXXX to the address on file. '' First of all despite ten weeks of " research '' time, ( during which i was bounced around four times in a now recognizable tactic of delay and obfuscate ) this woman 's " research '' consists of nothing more than a recitation of the ending transactions. Note she also doesn't give the date the deposit was made. 
And what's really funny is here Wells complains about my conduct. 
One is a charge off for XXXX USD The other charge off of XXXX This is the same account that was closed, keeping XXXX for three and a half years.

These two charge offs she mentions were indirectly caused by overcharges ... again not my interpretation. The well-publicized group lawsuit of Wells found that I was one of the abused ( excessive fees ) and offered me an award. 

In Wells response " XXXX XXXX '' talks around the crux of this and offered only those two lines, characterizing the XXXX as my " overpayment ''. Well this is a flat out lie. 

Those monies were not an " overpayment '' and they did not send a check to me. They just sent a check someplace, and they knew that. Due to my many complaints, they knew exactly where i was, and I have them recorded telling me they could not send a check to XXXX ( where I now reside ). 

This bank has lied to me so many times I've lost count. I've recorded almost every phone call from them. Some examples : In the very first call, the call center person " XXXX '' admitted over charges and offered me a XXXX dollar refund. I accepted. Nothing happened. A year later, I got a note saying the amount had been reduced to XXXX dollars, and if I had a complaint, I could call a woman at a certain number. The number was a non-working number. I have the notes on that, too, and a name. That was years ago. 

More recently, during the last few months, four of the five people I've emailed with have lied to me in their first emails, promising to get back to me within a certain amount of time, and then vanishing, to be replaced with a new person, someone with no last name, like this latest " XXXX XXXX ''. 

In between I often talked to polite people who said they could do nothing, and almost as often interacted with someone who purported to be the " final authority '' or " the highest level of escalation '' only to lie to me, and then when called on it, disappear. 

These Wells people operate as both a bank, and a criminal enterprise.

They're persistently dishonest. They steal. They lie about it. The news is full of examples, I'm just another one. 

Back in 2018, I hadn't much money. Since then, I've inherited a Wells managed trust of approximately XXXX XXXX USD and a Payable on Death lump of cash of about XXXX USD. Unfortunately, the trust is managed by Wells, and the POD cash is in a Wells account. I asked Wells to open a new account or re open my old account so I could receive these monies.

As you can see in this attached, Wells refused to open a new or reopen the old account.

Risibly the reasons Wells gives are because of the two old charge offs, collectively amounting to less than XXXX USD ... .which their excessive fees generated. 
Again, not my opinion, but the findings of the court. 
And because I'm not in the US. 
And even though they've been keeping the XXXX deposit for more than three years. 

It would not surprise me if they are somehow trying to hang on to the aforementioned inherited money to somehow eat some fees out of it. Or something. Initially I got an email stating that their " research '' might cost XXXX dollars an hour. I put a flea in their ear about that, and they backed down. 

The trust will clear probate soon, so that has not yet been delayed, but because I am unable to put the XXXX cash anywhere ; they've hung on to it for these past five months.

This stuff isn't an accident. Not after three and a half years of wrangling. Wells ' consumer complaint structure is designed to be multiple dead ends buttressed by lies and evasions.

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