Consumer complaint received 2022-08-15
Company: FIFTH THIRD FINANCIAL CORPORATION
State: NC
Product: Mortgage
Sub-product: Home equity loan or line of credit (HELOC)
Issue: Struggling to pay mortgage

Complaint:
XXXX XXXX XXXX XXXX XXXX ( 2 hours ago ) to XXXX, XXXX XXXX and XXXX, please forward this email to your supervisor and also to your complaints department. Additionally, I will be submitting this information to the CFPB and the OCC. My name is XXXX XXXX and I have worked with your customer, XXXX XXXXXXXX XXXX, XXXX # XXXX, as a friend and POA for the past 6 months attempting to refinance her home equity line/loan with 5th 3rd which became due in total on XX/XX/XXXX. Knowing that XXXX did not have the funds for this balloon payment, we began working with you in XXXX XXXX to develop an acceptable alternative to the balloon payment. 5th 3rd has taken over 6 months to determine how to restructure a {$50000.00} home equity loan! 

This complaint is about your processes and communications. Here 's a summary of the main categories of complaint : Credit underwriting process. Delays caused by last minute document requests ( at the end of the 30 day credit decision period ) and requests for documents that really were not needed, requests made piecemeal when they should have been requested all at once, early in the process, if at all. 5th 3rd has taken over 6 months to determine how to restructure a {$50000.00} home equity loan! 
Document uploading process/slow start Telephone numbers Communications On-line banking/automatic drafts ( ACH ) Payments during the last cycle when the balloon payment is due Below is more detail on each category. 

1. Credit Underwriting Process. Your department, or perhaps the underwriter working on XXXX 's loan, has a pattern of requesting new documents from the customer, one at a time, and thus starting the 30 day " credit decision clock '' over. 5th 3rd has strung out this request for months by waiting until close to the last day of the 30 day credit decision period and at that point asking for a new document. This pattern was repeated multiple times. Check out the timeline from your system below. Here 's a summary for your convenience : Date Document Sent XX/XX/XXXX Complete Package Acknowledgement - 30 day clock starts XX/XX/XXXX Initial Missing Item Letter XX/XX/XXXX Response provided by customer XX/XX/XXXX Complete Package Acknowledgement - 30 day clock starts XX/XX/XXXX Initial Missing Item Letter XX/XX/XXXX Response provided by customer XX/XX/XXXX Complete Package Acknowledgement - 30 day clock starts XX/XX/XXXX Initial Missing Item Letter Look at the gaps where the ball was in 5th 3rd 's court as I walk you through your timeline : 5th 3rd sent a Complete Package acknowledgement on XXXX and then waited until XXXX to request a document. The response was submitted on the same day by XXXX.

5th 3rd then waited from XXXX XXXX XXXX to send another Complete Package acknowledgement.

5th 3rd then waited from XXXX to XXXX and then issued a missing item request on XXXX.

The document was submitted to 5th 3rd on XXXX and on XXXX 5th 3rd issued another Complete package acknowledgement.

5th 3rd then waited from XXXX XXXX XXXX to request yet another document. This strategy of waiting until the 30 day credit decision deadline was near expiration to issue a request for a missing document is improper. Why couldn't all extra documents needed be requested at one time or at least closer together? Why was 5th 3rd trying to stretch this process out? Does the underwriter get dinged for each loan that is not decisioned within the 30 day period and thus he/she kicks out the deadline by requesting a new document over and over?

The length of time it took 5th 3rd to respond to each missing item that was provided was also unreasonable. As an example, it can be seen above in the summary, a customer response was sent on XXXX and was not acknowledged until XXXX.

This practice of waiting until the last few days of the 30 day credit decision period to request a new document and doing this multiple times is unfair and deceptive ; the regulators most likely would deem this a UDAAP issue. 

Lastly, none of the requests were earth shattering or based upon documents recently submitted : One was a question about whether or not we wanted to count XXXX 's son 's Food Stamps as income to XXXX. An odd question since we clearly noted that the son 's food stamps were for him and his XXXX children - we just listed them because her son and grandchildren lived with her, in an effort to be fully transparent. Why would we possibly want to increase her income when we are applying for hardship relief? 
The second request was for XXXX to sign a flood water acknowledgment- have no idea why. Of course XXXX knew her house was in a floodplain- she paid flood insurance and on every record one can access, it shows the house is in a floodplain. 
The third request was for a copy of XXXX 's flood insurance policy. 
All three of these items should have been requested, if truly needed, within days of her submitting the initial documentation. 

2. Uploading/slow start. The process got off to a very slow start. As previously documented to XXXX, XXXX first sent all of the required documents on XX/XX/XXXX and heard nothing for weeks ; she called and they said they didn't have them. ( The Mortgage XXXX says you will receive a response within 5 business days. ) Re-sent the same documents on XX/XX/XXXX and still heard nothing. XXXX called on XX/XX/XXXX and spoke with XXXX and found out that 3 of the 4 documents were uploaded but that one was received but not uploaded. There appears to be issues with uploading documents in your system. As you can see in your document below, everything was not uploaded in your system until XX/XX/XXXX. That is a month and a half just to get the initial documents uploaded in your system. 

3. Phone numbers. XXXX pointed out to XXXX that the phone number on the XXXX, " XXXX, option 3 '' does not get XXXX to the right place. They transferred XXXX to XXXX - the person that answered this line said the person that answered the XXXX number was off-shore and transferred XXXX to XXXX wrong place. 

XXXX. Communications XXXX continued to receive mail from 5th 3rd addressed to her and her deceased husband, long after death certificates, etc. on her husband were supplied. I am guessing this still has not been updated. 
XXXX received multiple communications from 5th 3rd letting her know that her equity line/loan was coming due in total on XX/XX/XXXX. Yes, and that's why we started the hardship process in XXXX! No one at 5th 3rd told the department sending out the " due in total '' letters that the customer was actively involved in the hardship program. 
XXXX. On-line banking/automatic drafts ( ACH ). There is something wrong in your system that does not allow a customer like XXXX who only has an equity line to set up on-line banking. We tried to set her up on-line. This didn't work because it asked for her debit card number ( she does not have a DDA with you. ) We called customer service and were told to go to a branch. The branch said they would help after the loan was refinanced?? We were never able to get XXXX set up with on-line banking nor were we able to set her account up to be drafted automatically by 5th 3rd each month for the payment due. 

XXXX. Payments during the last cycle. We tried to make a payment in early XXXX for the typical monthly amount. The payment at the branch was refused, they said the account was blocked. I am guessing this is because the balloon payment was due on XX/XX/XXXX and for some reason your system doesn't allow any payments during the period in which the balloon is due? As a creditor, it seems like you should be willing to take any amount at any time from a willing customer. The payment was not the payoff amount but it was something. 

Summary As you can see from the above it has been a most frustrating process for XXXX and myself. I have never banked or worked with 5th 3rd before and this was a poor introduction. Your branch personnel told XXXX the refinance/assistance process was easy and quick and would take about a week. 5th 3rd has taken over 6 months to determine how to restructure a {$50000.00} home equity loan! 

Sadly, XXXX has passed away. I am no longer involved in this situation. I can only hope that 5th 3rd treats XXXX 's family with a higher level of customer service than XXXX received. 

I did want to take the time and effort to document these issues so that 5th 3rd has the  opportunity to improve. 

Sincerely, XXXX XXXX

Company response to consumer: Closed with explanation