Consumer complaint received 2021-12-11
Company: CITIZENS FINANCIAL GROUP, INC.
State: NY
Product: Mortgage
Sub-product: Conventional home mortgage
Issue: Trouble during payment process

Complaint:
In XX/XX/XXXX we received a $ XXXX check in the mail from our mortgage company Citizens bank. We called to make sure this wasnt an error. The representative reassured us it wasnt and it would be ok to cash the check as well as informing us that our monthly mortgage payment would be decreasing approximately {$200.00} because we had over paid into our escrow. We had called again sometime later to verify this because it seemed so odd and was again told everything was fine. 

On XX/XX/XXXX we received a massive bill of {$6200.00} from citizens bank for an under payment of our taxes into our escrow account. We called on XX/XX/XXXX to figure out why this was. We were told by customer service that it was an issue with the tax department so we were transferred to them. We spoke to an incredibly helpful and pleasant employee named XXXX who methodically went over our bills, this specific bill, our taxes from XXXX and we had both come to conclusion that there was an error in assessing our school taxes for the county in XXXX. Citizens bank had assessed our taxes on XX/XX/XXXX and then again reassessed on XX/XX/XXXX, which she told us would only have happened if something odd showed. Our county taxes are released in XX/XX/XXXX of every year. The employee agreed that this was an egregious error on their tax departments behalf. She promised she would stay on the line with us until we got a supervisor to clear it up for us. She then contacted customer service again and requested a supervisor for us. We were put on hold for almost an hour. We had already been on the phone for over an hour at this point. Finally a supervisor named XXXX, or XXXX, came in the line. This supervisor was immediately rude and dismissive. He would blatantly not respond to questions, he would ignore statements made by either us or the employee XXXX. He told us it only happened because " it was just bad luck '' on our part. He put us on hold multiple times and then eventually asked XXXX if " she worked for our counties tax department or citizen banks tax department? ". When XXXX responded that she worked for citizens bank he was verbally annoyed and hung up the line. XXXX was still on the line, apologized profusely and insisted on staying with us until we got another customer service supervisor on the line. 

Finally after another long hold we are put on the line with XXXX XXXX, who is another customer service supervisor. We explain the situation to her as well as XXXX corroboration to our situation and the mistake in citizens bank behalf. This is now XXXX hours on the phone. XXXX is helpful and pleasant and tells us she is going to escalate our situation to the vice president of customer service and would contact us back asap. This was Thursday XX/XX/XXXX and we were on the phone for just shy of 5 hours. Multiple extended holds for reason explained to us and one dropped call by a supervisor. I called multiple times on XX/XX/XXXX and left messages on XXXX XXXX 's voicemail multiple times. I called Monday XX/XX/XXXX and did the same multiple times. Tuesday the XXXX I did as well and eventually had to call the regular customer service line and request to speak to XXXX. 

Finally she reached out to us that afternoon. We were on the phone with her for around an hour again and although she agreed it is bad practice on their part to assess taxes before taxes are released, and it was awful that their customer service told us everything would be fine on multiple occasions, as well that we were correct in noticing some red flags and reaching out to citizens bank to clarify, and that it shouldn't be on the customer to have to do the work of the company that they pay, that citizens would not be helping us in the way we see fit. They offered to let us pay the bill I'm monthly installments instead of the one month due date they have us originally. When I explained that this was entirely unacceptable that we should have to pay this giant bill due to citizens Banks error she agreed but told us " this is what my supervisor instructed me to offer you ''. 

I told her this was not the right outcome and that her supervisor would have to contact me personally or we would be contacting an attorney. She would open a claim and escalate this, we would receive a call within 48 hours. We stressed a callback as soon as possible as this very large bill is due XX/XX/XXXX. To date we still have yet to hear back from anyone at citizens.

Company response to consumer: Closed with explanation