Consumer complaint received 2020-05-19
Company: BANK OF AMERICA, NATIONAL ASSOCIATION
State: GA
Product: Checking or savings account
Sub-product: Checking account
Issue: Problem caused by your funds being low
Sub-issue: Bounced checks or returned payments

Complaint:
I was scammed by someone who portrayed to be hiring me as an employee and I deposited the bank as they instructed me to. The bank cleared the check the day after I deposited it for {$4800.00}. The third day, they reversed the funds and took the {$1600.00} I had saved in my business bank account. I then realized I had been scammed so I called the fraud department to report it. I was on the phone from XXXX to past XXXX with several reps with Bank of America and kept getting transferred over and over including the XXXX department because the person had me wire {$1500.00} to someone. One of the reps told me they coud recover those funds being that I transferred it to someone named XXXX XXXX and was told her bank was named XXXX XXXX and that they were going to recover the funds and have her account closed. I was then made to wire {$2700.00} worth of money order from the post office, which I payed for with my business debit card. Then the bank tells me they have no record of all my conversations ( which I wrote down the rep names I spoke to that day ). I was then told I would have to initiate a new scam report, only to be muted by the rep I was talking to. I asked the rep if I could talk to a supervisor and she told me that even if she let me talk to a supervisor that I would get told the same thing she told me, which was a threat of being treated as though I was the criminal. She told me that I had 120 days to pay off the full balance of the check, and that I was facing the possibility of having my account closed and they would possibly take the money out of my other accounts to recover some of the negative balance and that they would also red flag me to other banks so that I would not be able to open an account with anyone else. I could not believe how rudely and unfairly I was treated by them after having three accounts with them and having banked with them for many years. I was just another number, and kept getting told there was no one above I could talk to. I am being forced to pay this balance, and they took my hard earned money out of my account for something they clearly told me they saw that I was a victim of a scam. The bankers at my local bank know me and they know I am a decent, law abiding citizen and they did not know what to do to help me. They all told me that this happens all of the time, but that unfortunately I still had to pay them back. I told them I am unemployed and in this pandemic, I have no unemployment benefits of any kind and was not able to repay them, and they did not care about any of my concerns. With this being such an on-going situation, why would the bank clear such a large amount on a check the next day, instead of assuring the check cleared fully before releasing the funds to the customer to protect them from these scammers. So these scammers got away with what they did to me and no one is doing anything to help me, and the bank is threatening me if I don't pay them back this money. I am in such great distress.

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