Consumer complaint received 2022-08-02
Company: BANK OF THE WEST
State: CO
Product: Payday loan, title loan, or personal loan
Sub-product: Personal line of credit
Issue: Charged fees or interest you didn't expect

Complaint:
My husband and I have a Home Equity Line of Credit ( HELOC ), as well as a checking account, with Bank of the West for {$200000.00}. We live in Colorado and opened these accounts a Bank of the West branch near our home. We recently paid it off, but continued to keep the line of credit open, for our next planned home renovations. 

We had not touched the accounts in several months when, on Saturday, XX/XX/2022 we received a call and emails from a Bank of the West branch manager in California asking us to contact him about an issue with our account. It was a Saturday, and we were at our daughter 's XXXX XXXX and we were unable to contact the branch manager in XXXX, California prior to the bank closing at XXXX XXXX XXXX XXXX. Instead, we reviewed our accounts online and determined that there had been almost {$70000.00} in authorized advances from our HELOC between the XXXX of XXXX and the present. We contacted Bank of the West 's customer service support and were told that they were unable to freeze the accounts ; that we would need to do this by physically going to a local Bank of the West branch. 

On Monday, XX/XX/XXXX, we were able to contact the Bank of the West branch manager in XXXX, California and were told that a woman claiming to be me, with a Colorado Driver 's License with my name on it, had walked into his branch and requested more money from our Bank of the West checking account than was currently in the account. She had stated that she was in town for funeral and needed money. When we asked the branch manager about the other transactions on the HELOC that were close {$70000.00}, the branch manager in California stated that he was unaware of those transactions and instructed us to visit a local XXXX branch. 

That morning, Monday, XX/XX/XXXX, we visited a local branch and froze the accounts, but were given no information by the Bank of the West employees we spoke with about how this had happened. I filed a report with our local police and was told that the detective assigned would work with Bank of the West and local California police to investigate the matter. 

Later that week, when completing an Affidavit of Identity Theft for Bank of the West, we determined that the total taken from the accounts was now closer to {$88000.00}. We were assured by Bank of the West that they would be completing an investigation into the issue and that we would not be responsible for making any payments towards the amount stolen from the accounts until the conclusion of the investigation, which we were told could take up to 90 days. 

At present, we have not received any return calls or further information from Bank of the West regarding the status of the investigation, or if one was even started. Bank of the West will not return our calls, nor will they return the calls of the detective assigned to the identity theft case I reported. Our online access to the accounts has been locked. 

The most maddening portion of this is that Bank of the West has continued to send us bills for the stolen amounts, when they assured us that we did not need to make payments towards the loan balance while the issue was under investigation. We have now received a " Late Payment Notice '' because we did not make a payment towards the loan balance for XXXX.

Company response to consumer: Closed with explanation