Consumer complaint received 2021-06-02
Company: Coinbase, Inc.
State: DC
Product: Money transfer, virtual currency, or money service
Sub-product: Virtual currency
Issue: Other transaction problem

Complaint:
On or around XX/XX/XXXX XXXX placed a trade in my Coinbase.com account for approximately {$15000.00} worth of a digital asset / cryptocurrency OMG. The trade did not seem to go through initially. My available balance still showed the same {$15000.00} balance as before the trade, so I placed the trade again. 

Both trades apparently did go through, but I didn't want both and didn't have funds available for both. So the issue is on their end. To make matters worse, they then attempted to draft the additional {$15000.00} from my personal Savings account tied to my account, which I had made deposits from previously but did NOT authorize this time. 

This email was sent to me from Coinbase a few days later : " On XX/XX/2021, you attempted a transfer of {$15000.00} USD. Unfortunately, the transfer failed due to either a lack of funds or a technical problem with the transfer itself. 

" In order to complete your payment, you must either initiate another transfer or use funds from your Coinbase account. '' But I had already emailed them with the following subject line : " I did not authorize trade from my XXXX XXXX account. Duplicate Trade. '' and received an auto-response with a case number of # XXXX On XX/XX/XXXX I received a notice : " Automatic recovery notice On XX/XX/2021, you attempted a transfer of {$15000.00} USD. Unfortunately, the transfer failed and we still have not received payment. 

As a result, on XX/XX/2021 we will begin an automatic recovery. This could include selling your cryptocurrency holdings on both Coinbase and Coinbase Pro. To prevent this, please make a payment today '' During this time I had also attempted to change my username, which should have been ok, but then I received this email : " Hello XXXX, Thank you for bringing this to our attention. 

We have put a hold on your account 's ability to login for the time being until you are certain that your account is secure. No new outgoing transactions will be possible while the account is disabled, but pending transactions can not be stopped due to the irrevocable nature of digital currency transactions. We have a few questions that will help us begin isolating the incident. '' To which I replied answering all their questions.

-- The big issue is that this has never resolved. Coinbase keeps sending me extensions of longer periods of time I have to expect to wait, while I can not access my account funds. 
My CoinbasePro account was also frozen, which is a totally separate account where there were no issues.

It has now been Six weeks, with both of my accounts frozen and unable to access my funds or investments to buy / sell. It's beyond reasonable and unfair with no communication. 

The last email I received was on XX/XX/XXXX when I filed a formal complaint with Coinbase. 

Case # XXXX - Complaint # XXXX To which they replied : " Thanks for filing a Formal Complaint with Coinbase.

The Disputes Team is currently looking into your Complaint and we require some more time to fully investigate and respond to you. Please allow up to 20 business days to fully investigate your complaint and provide you with a Resolution Notice. 

Thanks for your patience, we will provide you with a response as soon as possible. 

Coinbase Support '' -- -- -- This should have been a simple matter to resolve, but I feel like I'm being unfairly treated in response to a problem with their web technology, which misled me into believing I had not placed my trade and had funds available. Now they are punishing me it seems for this honest mistake, but really they are to blame for their software not functioning. 

This is and has caused me financial harm, and I'd like this resolved with my funds released immediately.

Company response to consumer: Closed with monetary relief