Consumer complaint received 2017-02-05
Company: BANK OF AMERICA, NATIONAL ASSOCIATION
State: FL
Product: Bank account or service
Sub-product: Other bank product/service
Issue: Account opening, closing, or management

Complaint:
Good Afternoon. My wife and I have multiple accounts with Bank of America and Merrill Lynch including, checking, savings, credit cards, brokerage, and a retirement account. Bank of America and Merril offer a program called XXXX Rewards which works with different tiers. If the client has a {$20000.00} or more XXXX combined rolling average the client qualifies for the XXXX level of the preferred rewards. The XXXX tier provides the client with certain perks such as a XXXX % bonus when redeeming cash rewards to a checking account, a interest booster on your savings account, in addition to other things. About XXXX months ago ( or more ) my wife and I rolled over a retirement account into XXXX XXXX to ensure that we met the XXXX threshold. The rollover was done with a Merrill XXXX representative who was informed what we were doing and the fact that the only reason we were rolling the funds over was to qualify for the program. At the time I also gave myself a reminder so I would check in XXXX months later to make sure that we had in fact qualified for preferred rewards and were receiving the benefits. 

To date, I have called both Bank of America and XXXX Edge/Lynch about a dozen times and spent countless house on the phone, on hold, and waiting for a designated call back that never happens. Each time I call it is a complete hassle ( and a waste ) as I have to also get my wife on the phone so she can verify her accounts before being able to speak to a representative. Initially, we were told that it took a couple of weeks more than the XXXX period to qualify, so we decided to wait a couple of weeks, and when nothing happened called again. We were then told that the reason why the accounts were not showing as qualifying for preferred rewards was because we needed to change my wife 's maiden to her new married last name ( something we should have been told months ago but were not ), so we submitted all the paperwork to have her last name changed and the representative informed me she would call me back in XXXX days. XXXX weeks later she had yet to call. The next time we called I had to explain everything and a representative informed me that he would get a hold of the individual that was working on the problem and have her call me within XXXX hours, again no one called. About a week later I called again, explained everything and was told that a request had to be submitted to a certain department in order to have this issue corrected, I was told I would get a call back by the end of the day but never received XXXX. The last time I called XXXX XXXX I was told that a representative would call me back once the issue was resolved. Feeling absolutely sick and tired of being given the go around I informed the representative of my many grievances and told them if they did not actually call me back I would be closing our accounts as the only reason we had moved money to the bank XXXX moths ago was to qualify for the preferred rewards program, they never called back. Every time we have called we are told there is a problem and that someone will call us back once it is fixed, they never call back. Every representative insists that the issue must be resolved by either the last representative I spoke too or a XXXX that is never present, never have I had someone simply resolve the issue. I have been assured that I would receive a call back over XXXX at this point and every time I wait over a week and find myself having to start over from the start. We were told " they would fix it, they would make sure that it was back-dated XXXX months for loss of time, and that there would be a follow-up call '' all false statements, and untrue. 

At this point, we are kindly asking if the CFPB can please step in on our behalf to advocate, as the bank is clearly unable to, or unwilling to handle the matter internally and we are absolutely hopeless. Thanks!

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