Consumer complaint received 2018-04-22
Company: WELLS FARGO & COMPANY
State: TX
Product: Money transfer, virtual currency, or money service
Sub-product: Domestic (US) money transfer
Issue: Fraud or scam

Complaint:
I received a scam phone call at my office on XX/XX/XXXX at XXXX XXXX  and the caller introduced herself as an FBI agent and she threatened to arrest me because of unpaid taxes to IRS due to my student loans and told me that my university will revoke my degree because of that crime. She told me that you need to drive to IRS branch in XXXX to clear your debt and pay your fines in advance via a wire transfer and when you get to IRS office they will give you a reimbursement check and all charges against you will be dropped. I was very scared and as an XXXX   I felt very vulnerable and wanted to clear my name on the records since I had not done anything wrong and I was worried that this might jeopardize my new job and embarrass me in front of my boss. 

Under pressure, first I paid {$9800.00} via wire transfer at a Wellsfargo bank near my work place in XXXX XXXX TX to the account number the scammer sent to me which was a XXXX XXXX XXXX branch in XXXX Florida. They also made me buy {$9700.00} money order from my Wellsfargo debit card and mail them to an address in Florida via XXXX. 

After I realized that it was a scam a few hours later, I immediately contacted Wellsfargo customer service and notified them about these two frauds and filed a police report. I asked Wellsfargo to freeze my account and reverse the wire transfer and submitted a claim for the other {$9700.00} transaction. At that time, money was still in my account and the transaction was pending. Telephone customer service told me that we can not do anything about it and you must show up at your local branch and ask them to take care of it. I told them, in this case the timing matters and if I wait until tomorrow morning to go the branch that might be too late. But they did not do anything. Luckily, I stopped the money order by contacting XXXX  and they immediately stopped the delivery and resend the envelope back to me. However, I could not do anything about the wire transaction. 

In the morning of XX/XX/XXXX, just after the Wellsfargo branch in XXXX XXXX TX opened I showed up and asked them to send an alert about this activity and shared the police report and the contact info of the officer working with me on this case. They told me that we created an alert and it should stop the transaction because most of wire transactions take 24 hours or more and I had a few hours to stop it. After checking with my bank again in the afternoon, they told me that the alert was sent out around XXXX XXXX on XX/XX/XXXX but I did not hear back from the Wellsfargo and at that time transaction was completed and money collected by the scammers to my surprise! I called the wire transfer department of Wellsfargo on XX/XX/XXXX hours after the incident and they checked the status of my alert and notified me that it was just sent out a few minutes ago on XX/XX/XXXX around XXXX XXXX! I was furious and asked them why it took so long to stop this transaction and why you misinformed my bank. They told me that we address the alerts in the order in which it was received, and they blamed me for not taking care of my account and I am responsible for loosing my money! I was traumatized and received no sympathy or immediate action from Wellsfargo.

Id like to submit a complaint against Wellsfargo for not taking immediate action on freezing my account and giving false information to the customer and the local branch and their attitude toward a traumatized and disturbed victim. Wellsfargo did not do anything on the debit card transaction either and again blamed me for my carelessness. I lost {$9800.00} because Wellsfargo carelessly took care of the situation and delayed sending the freeze alert to the receiver bank. I also feel very embarrassed and shameful for being so vulnerable and my life, my judgment, and my work has been affected by this incident greatly. I believe Wellsfargo must take responsibility and compensate me for their careless actions.

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