Consumer complaint received 2020-09-08
Company: BANK OF AMERICA, NATIONAL ASSOCIATION
State: AP
Product: Credit reporting, credit repair services, or other personal consumer reports
Sub-product: Credit reporting
Issue: Problem with a credit reporting company's investigation into an existing problem
Sub-issue: Problem with personal statement of dispute

Complaint:
What's the complaint is about? 

Bank of America ( BOA ) acted on " bad faith '' and unfairly sent a negative report to the Credit Bureau agencies causing excessive burn out on my financial, family, and personal life even when I'd tried to work the issue with them. The account in reference is 2nd Mortgage loan number ending in XXXX. 

What time of problem am I having? 

This issue created three significant issues : 1. Stopped the process for refinancing the Bank of America 1st Mortgage loan ending in XXXX and the 2nd Mortgage Loan ending in XXXX, which was in the closing stage of the process when this issue arises. 

2. Created " unfairly, '' a negative report that downgraded my credit scores considerably.

3. Due to my military job, this negative report might negatively affect my military career and future job assignments. 

What happened? 

I bought a property in XXXX and financed it with BOA. I processed a 1st Mortgage loan, and at the same time, I received a 2nd Mortgage Balloon Loan from BOA in XXXX when we bought the property in XXXX. For 15 years, I paid the 1st Mortgage and 2nd Mortgage without any issues until now that the balloon payment was due in XX/XX/XXXX. I didn't have any problems with BOA, except when approximately in XXXX, the BOA changed the account number in one of my loans without notification and did not post the payments that I sent. Although I kept sending the payments, they reported me to the Credit Bureau because they didn't post it in the account. After further research and hours of conversation with their mortgage department, they finally posted the payments to the correct account and resolved it. 

This issue was my first bad experience with BOA. After this bad experience, I started researching to refinance the loans with another bank or mortgage company. Unfortunately, I was going through a lousy divorce process at that time, and because my ex-wife damaged my credit, I was not able to refinance neither one of the loans with BOA. 

I then tried to sell the property, but because the market was not there, the offers that I received were almost {$25000.00} below what I owned BOA, so I continued with the property. Additionally, the divorce decree awarded me this property, and I kept trying to refinance under my name only and removed my ex-wife from the loan. Although I was going through all these issues, I met my mortgage payments on time and without delays. 

Since I was making payments and had no other credit issues, I tried to refinance the property again a couple of years later. I'd tried to refinance with several mortgage companies, including BOA. I tried at least three times with BOA before I started looking at other companies, but BOA dropped the process every time without explanation or never returned my calls. Be aware that I'm in the XXXX and XXXX   XXXX since XXXX. I started these processes before I went XXXX   and continued after I was XXXX there. 

Unfortunately, for years I'd tried to refinance these loans, but I had no success. I tried hard to refinance and combine the two loans into one because the 2nd Mortgage Balloon was getting close to its balloon payment, and I knew it was going to be hard to meet that payment of {$17000.00} without sacrificing our cash savings. As I was looking for refinance options, the financial institutions gave different answers on why they could not refinance the property. One institution told me that I could not refinance because the bank would not cover the amount of the loans, others because they did not finance 2nd homes, and others because they required that I live in the property. There was always an issue. 

After unsuccessfully trying with several mortgage companies and banks, I learned that XXXX XXXX XXXX XXXX ( XXXX ) was processing 2nd Home Mortgage. Because I had a couple of loans with them that I always paid on time and already paid off, I contacted XXXX as an option. At this time, I'm already XXXX here in XXXX XXXX. I started contacting and sending e-mails to XXXX   back in XXXX XXXX. I did not receive any e-mails or contact until sometimes in XX/XX/XXXX. I finally started the process in XXXX and was expected to close sometime in XXXX or the beginning of XX/XX/XXXX. 

Due to some issues with their process, the closing date was pushed to the right several times. In the meantime, XX/XX/XXXX, the date for my balloon payment was getting closer and closer. After going back and forward with XXXX on this process, XXXX told me that they were ready to close in XX/XX/XXXX. By the end of XXXX, I contacted XXXX and advised them that I had to close not later than XX/XX/XXXX because that was the balloon payment date. Throughout all these months, I locked my rate with XXXX, so I was expecting to complete the loan process on time. 

XX/XX/XXXX came up, and XXXX did not close, although they had all the necessary papers and had been pre-approved since XX/XX/XXXX. Finally, I was able to contact XXXX, and everything looks like we were moving forward with the closing as I received e-mails from XXXX informing me that the loan was passed to the closing department and should receive instructions from the closing department. 

At this time, I knew that I already default my full payment for {$17000.00} to BOA, but because I was under the impression that I was ready to close and would need the money for the closing cost, I saved the money and did not send the payment. However, I sent the regular amount of {$190.00}, hoping that BOA would take the payment. In XX/XX/XXXX, I tried to contact BOA, but after spending hours on the phone in XXXX 's long-distance call, nothing got resolved. In those calls, I called the regular customer support number to explain my situation and let them know that I was in the process to refinance and make the payment. Be aware that the waiting time was approximately 90 mins.

After waiting for 90 mins, and occasionally more, I finally talked to a customer services rep. This time I told them not to hand up the phone and that I was trying to resolve my is
sue. Once I mentioned that I was in the XXXX, the customer service rep transferred me to the SCRA department, where I had to wait some additional time. After the SCRA answer the phone, they told me that there was nothing they could do and that I have to talk to the mortgage department, and they transferred me again. I waited on the line until the mortgage department answered the phone, and once I explained the issue, they transferred me back to customer service, where the waiting time was again 90 mins. While I was waiting again, their system hanged up the phone and disconnected me from their queue. 

Since I used all my available minutes to resolve this issue in XXXX, I had to wait until XX/XX/XXXX to try again. In the meantime, I kept working with XXXX to finalize and close the loan. I even received a closing date in the process, and I was excited to hear that, but the closing date passed, and nothing got done. Even with this situation in the " limbo, '' I continued to make my regular payments of {$190.00} to BOA 2nd Mortgage. Still, on XX/XX/XXXX, BOA returned the amount to my bank without any action. 

Back in XX/XX/XXXX, I called BOA again to explain and try the resolve the issue, but the process and results were the same. I called customer service to only be transferred from one department to the next without any action or results. At one time, I " begged '' the operator not to transfer me back to customer service, which she ignored and transferred the call back to customer service. The same situation happened ; I got disconnected after waiting on the line. 

My hope was that XXXX finished the process since the closing officer already sent me an e-mail and was just waiting for a closing date. 

In XX/XX/XXXX, I received a letter from XXXX informing me that they could no longer process my loan because BOA placed a negative report on my credit. I was distraught and tried to call XXXX  for an explanation, which was similar to BOA ; nobody answered their phones. After several e-mails and phone calls, I was finally able to talk to XXXX Closing Processor, who told me that because the long time that it took them to process the loan application, they had to run a new credit report. Now in the new Credit Report, the 2nd Mortgage Payment showed as default, there was nothing she could do. She advised me that if BOA removed the late payment, they would be able to close the refinance loan. Although I was expecting something like this, especially from BOA, I was not ready for the amount they reported to the Credit Bureau. 

To my surprise, BOA reported that I defaulted {$130.00} payments since XX/XX/XXXX ( Exhibit # 004 ). I was expecting to see, and maybe to be fair, a default payment of {$17000.00}. But when I saw that the amount was for {$130.00}, I was in shock for several reasons. First, I kept making payments of {$190.00} in XXXX and XXXX, which is more than the quantity that they reported me. Second, if they reported me for not paying {$130.00}, why did they return the payment that I made for {$190.00} ( Exhibit # 005 )? Third, although I understand that even if I'm protected under SCRA law, the bank can still report me to the Credit Bureau for not paying, I don't understand why they could not allow me to make the payments until I XXXX resolve their issues with their process. I would pay off both loans. 

In XX/XX/XXXX, I contacted BOA to talk about this issue, and the results were the same. Even at one point, the customer service told me that she did not know why they reported me for {$130.00} and had no idea where that came from. Additionally, she processed a payment for three months that I made toward the 2nd Mortgage ending XXXX. When she verified the account number, she mentioned the XXXX Mortgage loan 's account number ending in XXXX. I told her that that was the wrong number. After waiting more time on the line, she came back and said to me that even if it shows account ending in XXXX, the amount was going to be posted to the 2nd Mortgage loan ending in XXXX. I told her that, if that was the case, go ahead and process the payment. A couple of days later, I reviewed my accounts in BOA online to find out that they posted the amount to the 1st Mortgage ending in XXXX and not the 2nd Mortgage ending in XXXX. Again I spent all my available minutes for the month trying to resolve this issue and work a satisfactory solution with BOA. 

In XX/XX/XXXX, I placed a complaint with BOA customer service, and all I received was the promise that they were going to look at it. Later, I received an e-mail with no additional information, and all the questions that I placed in their message system were unanswered. 

After this final conversation, I went to my local bank and tried to get a loan to pay off the loan. Not to my surprise, the local bank denied me the loan. Again, because of the negative report that BOA placed on my credit report. 

After this final situation, I gave up and decided to pay off the loan with our savings, so I don't have to deal anymore with BOA. I went to my bank in the United States and created a wire transfer to pay off the loan, which was rejected because I was in XXXX XXXX ( Exhibit # 002 ). I transferred the money from my XXXX XXXX to my local bank, and a couple of days later, I paid off the 2nd Mortgage loan ending in XXXX ( Exhibit # 003 ). 

However, the damage was already done, and it will take years before I can recuperate from this issue. At this time, I can not refinance the loan with any company, even when I clear over {$10000.00} a month with basically no other loans, except for these loans with BOA and my car payments. I will have to continue paying the 1st Mortgage loan to BOA, which conveniently stands at a 6 % interest rate. This rate doubles the current mortgage rate in the current market of 3 %. This issue will cost me thousands of dollars on unnecessary payments. Besides, the credit bureau 's negative report might negatively affect my job due to reasons that I can not explain here. 

In the past couple of months, I spent over 13 hours trying to work on BOA without any positive results. See the attached telephone report ( Exhibit # 001 ) as it includes all the phone calls that I could find. Unfortunately, BOA was never able to provide me a feasible solution. Nor before, not now. Their customer support was not able to assist me with any of my issues. No supervisor was available to try to resolve my problem, and because I'm XXXX in XXXX, they said that they were not able to call XXXX from the states. Additionally, the only option that I had to call BOA was on a direct call because I can not make collect calls from XXXX. I researched collect calls from XXXX XXXX, but my telephone company informed me that even if I used the collect call number, they would still charge me for the minutes that I used. 

I always kept my finances straight. I met all my financial commitments for years without any issues or being late due to my fault. Even after the divorce and all the financial burned that that situation brought up to my life, I was able to meet all my financial obligations, and slowly, I was able to pay off all my bills and built up good credit. As I explained in this document, I tried year after year to find a satisfactory resolution to these loans, but there were always issues. Even during vacation time, I went to a BOA Mortgage office in Louisiana. After providing all my information and a promise that they were going to contact me, nothing happened.

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 non-monetary relief