Consumer complaint received 2018-11-25
Company: MoneyLion Inc.
State: CA
Product: Payday loan, title loan, or personal loan
Sub-product: Installment loan
Issue: Problem with additional add-on products or services

Complaint:
On XX/XX/18, I took out a {$500.00} loan from Moneylion.com. MoneyLion requires a {$21.00} loan payment taken out of my checking account every time I get paid ( which when I first took out the loan was on the XXXX and XXXX of every month, but then I changed jobs and it is now on every other Friday ) and {$39.00} membership fee taken out twice a month. I did not think it was fair that I had to pay for a membership I did not want just to get the loan, especially since the membership fee does not go towards the payment of the loan, but I was desperate, so I accepted the terms. When I first switched jobs, I notified them that I was now getting paid every other Friday, instead of the XXXX and XXXX and asked them to hold off taking out the payment until I was paid again. They did not respect my request, and tried to take out the fee, which caused me to have to pay on overdraft fee with my bank. Eventually, they changed it to correspond to when I get paid. On XX/XX/18, I fully paid off the loan by paying to MoneyLion {$300.00}, which was the amount plus interest that was still owed on the loan. According to my bank ( XXXX XXXXXXXX XXXX ), the payment has been fully processed on XX/XX/2018 and therefore the loan is paid in full. I sent an email to MoneyLion telling them they are not authorized to continue taking money out of my checking account, since I have paid off the loan and am canceling the membership. On XX/XX/18, they took out the membership fee of {$39.00}, even though the loan was already paid off and I had already informed them that I want to cancel the membership. I looked at my MoneyLion account and they are planning to take another {$39.00} membership out on XX/XX/18. They are not allowing me to cancel the account or fully access the money in my investment account. ( Part of the membership is they start an investment account for the member and if you click into their app every day they put {$1.00} into the account. This might sound great, but please take into account that membership dues are {$79.00} per month ( {$39.00} twice a month ), so even in months that are 31 days long and one clicks on the app every day, one is still behind {$48.00}, whereas one could probably get the same interest without having to pay them a membership fee, by just having that amount in one 's savings account. ) They say I have to keep {$150.00} in the investment account, even though I want to fully withdraw it to fully close the account. In connection with the investment account, they never allowed me any say on how that money should be invested. Also, they claim they haven't fully processed the payment, but I think this is their way of just trying to milk additional fees out of me. My bank shows it is paid. They are able to process the initial {$500.00} loan within a day, but my payment of the loan and to access the funds from the investment account take 5 to 7 business days ( and if the money from the investment account was in my savings account I could access the full amount ASAP ). Any help you can give me to have the account cancelled, stop them from withdrawing money from my checking account and if I could get back at least the XX/XX/18 {$39.00} fee would be greatly appreciated.

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