Consumer complaint received 2022-03-02
Company: BANK OF AMERICA, NATIONAL ASSOCIATION
State: CA
Product: Checking or savings account
Sub-product: Checking account
Issue: Managing an account
Sub-issue: Deposits and withdrawals

Complaint:
I have already filed a complaint previously, complaint # XXXX and my complaint was closed by Bank of America without resolution and using justification that contradicts their own words and is both incorrect and illegal. Further, in their response to me, they have provided contact info that is unreachable and disconnects without allowing you to reach the agent handling your case or even leave a voicemail. BofA, in the handling of these types of situations, should be urged to give out correct contact info. 

In reference to my case, BofA has deducted {$10000.00} from my personal checking account because of a withdrawal made by me from a business account of which I was an authorized Signer. They have claimed I was removed from the account the day prior and justified this deduction, claiming the " Right of Offset ''. However, " Right of Offset '' is not applicable in my case, as in BofA 's own words in their response to me, " An offset is allowed as long as both accounts have at least one common owner ''. I was not an owner of this account and BofA in their response admits this in stating, 'it was determined that prior to the withdrawals the bank was processing a request to remove your name as an authorized SIGNER from the accounts ''. And, even if I was an owner ( I was only a Signer ) of this Business account, BofA claims I was removed the day prior to the withdrawal, so using this rationale, I was NOT a Signer or a joint account owner the day the withdrawal was made, so how could my separate personal checking account be used to satisfy this debt? You can't claim I was removed from this account prior to the debt but claim I was also still an owner of the account at the same time? Either I was removed as a Signer the day prior to the withdrawal and BofA failed to let the rest of their company know this fact, aka this was a banking error to allow the withdrawal, or I was still a Signer, and in that case, the transaction was authorized.

This deduction from my personal account is not allowed based on the incorrect Right of Offset claim, but even further it should not be allowed because when the withdrawal was made by me, I was verified as an authorized Signer by both a BofA branch manager and BofA 's own fraud department, not even mentioning the double jeopardy listed above. If a request was made prior to the withdrawal to remove me as a Signer, but neither the local branch manager or BofA 's own fraud team was not made aware, then that is a banking error and not fraud on my part as was claimed in correspondence sent to me. 

What BofA has done here is to withdraw a debt incurred by a business, based on a banking error they created ( on an account I was only a SIGNER on ) from my personal checking account. This is not legal and under this assumption any accounting clerk, ( designated as a Signer, at any company ), would be on the hook for business debt if they happened to bank personally at the same institution. This is not correct practice, and this should be looked at much more closely by the CFPB and BofA internally.

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