Consumer complaint received 2016-10-11
Company: WELLS FARGO & COMPANY
State: TX
Product: Bank account or service
Sub-product: Checking account
Issue: Account opening, closing, or management

Complaint:
Hello, I ( XXXX XXXX ) and my wife ( XXXX XXXX XXXX ) once had a joint checking account ( acct # XXXX ) and savings account with Wells Fargo Bank. On XX/XX/2016, we tried to use our ATM debit cards to make purchases and also to withdraw some funds but it wo n't let us do so. My wife visited one of the branches of Wells Fargo bank to find out why our ATM cards were no longer working. She was told by one of the bank representatives that the account had been blocked and that in the next few weeks, the account will be completely closed out. She attempted to find out the reason why but they wo n't tell her. Rather, they referred her to call a number ( XXXX ) to discuss the matter further with them. My wife informed me of the matter and we both called the number to find out the reason why Wells Fargo had place a hold on our account. They wo n't tell us the reason why they had decided to block our account and to close it in the weeks to come. A few days later, we received a letter in the mailing stating that by XX/XX/2016, that our account will be completely closed and that if we had funds in our account when it is closed, they will send us a cashier 's check for the amount of money that we had left in both our checking and savings account. On XX/XX/2016, I called them to check to see if they have closed the accounts and mailed us the cashier 's checks. They informed us that they have not yet done so but will do so on or about XX/XX/2016 and they then informed us that they were investigating our accounts for fraud ( this was when they told us for the first time the reason why they were investigating our accounts. We called again on XX/XX/2016 to find out if they had now finished their investigation, closed our accounts and mailed us the cashier 's checks but they told us that they had not done so and that they had not finished investigating the accounts yet. I called them again on XX/XX/2016 and this time, they informed us that they had finished their investigation on XX/XX/2016 and had mailed us our cashier 's checks on XX/XX/2016 and that we should expect to receive them in about 7-10 business days. They informed us that we should receive it by XX/XX/XXXX and that if we did n't receive it by then, we should call them back. On XX/XX/2016, we called them back since we had not received the checks by XX/XX/2016. They informed us that they were still investigating the accounts and that they have not yet mailed the checks to us. We told the them that they had lied to us when they told us that they had finished the investigation on XX/XX/2016 and mailed the checks to us on XX/XX/2016. In fact, they had actually not finished investigating the accounts according to what they told us on XX/XX/2016. They told us to call them back in about 48 hours from XX/XX/2016 when I had called them to find out the status of the accounts. I called them again on XX/XX/2016, which was 48 hours later from XX/XX/2016. This time, they told us that they could not release our checks to us because of the investigation of fraud. We have recorded all these conversations in an audio recording to substantiate all these information we are providing you and we have attached two letters they sent us. The first letter reveals their promise to us that they will send us cashier 's checks for our accounts when they finish their investigation and the second one shows that they took our funds after they closed our accounts instead of sending them to us. Therefore, I am filing this complaint with you against Wells Fargo bank so that we can get back our money. We are also seeking damages for financial difficulties they put me and my family through due to inability to pay our bills. Amount in checking account was {$7300.00} and in savings account was {$1100.00}.

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 monetary relief