Consumer complaint received 2020-03-01
Company: WELLS FARGO & COMPANY
State: GA
Product: Checking or savings account
Sub-product: Other banking product or service
Issue: Problem caused by your funds being low
Sub-issue: Non-sufficient funds and associated fees

Complaint:
This complaint is a follow-up to Wells Fargo XX/XX/XXXX Resolution Letter. 

In the XX/XX/XXXX Resolution Letter, XXXX gave the reasons why Wells Fargo did not reply to my request to work with third-party investors and lenders I brought to Wells Fargo during 12 month + ongoing investigation ; and the reason that was given is because I did not sign a borrowers consent form but I was told about this requirement almost 7 months after I repeatedly made Wells Fargo aware of these credible opportunities that would have given us the working capital we needed to get back on track. In addition to these lenders/Investors, is a more recent ( first week of XX/XX/XXXX ) investor/lender that did not receive a returned phone call or email is from another customer/new investor, XXXX, called & emailed XXXX the 1st week of XXXX & no response. 

After Wells Fargo realized that this was a serious problem, I was asked by XXXX XXXX to go back and revisit the lenders ( especially the opportunity zone lenders ) but because so much time had gone by the opportunity zone lenders ran out of money and told me that I would have to wait for at least another 18 months before they get new funding and as a result, the investors/lenders were no longer interested... now property taxes ( building, inventory, and equipment ) for the county are due and they could put a lock on the doors any day in the next 30 to 60 days. And to think Wells Fargo would still have the unmitigated gall to even contemplate liquidation when they dropped the ball is an outrage. Over the last 3 + years since the fraud, I have been treated like XXXX as if I am a criminal with even more harsh treatment during the 12-month one-sided biased investigation conducted in secret with no replies/responses to any of my communications for at least 9 months. And you took away my ability to generate revenue. 

What is even more troubling is that Wells Fargo still want me to pay all delinquent SBA loan payments with interest, accrued interest and penalties on state and federal withholding taxes while I had working capital lined up but Wells Fargo is directly responsible for blowing this opportunity to obtain working capital from these third party lenders/investors that I worked hard to bring to the table ; the point is I would have been able to get back on track with the working capital from at least one of these opportunity zone lenders ( and yes we are located in an opportunity zone and HUBZone ). And the insulting poor excuse I get after 7 + months is that I did not sign a borrowers consent form!!!!... 7+ months after I first contacted Wells Fargo about the third party lenders/investors willing to provide working capital, Wells Fargo crafts this poor excuse. 

And to top it off, now Wells Fargo needs more time ( this has to be delay # 11 or 12 in the last 12 months quite frankly, I lost count of the number of delays ) to do your research!... What is there to research? Once again Wells Fargo blew another opportunity to fix this mess. 

So in the XX/XX/XXXX Resolutions... 
Here are the abundantly clear contradictions in your XX/XX/XXXX Resolution Letter concerning the reason you did not reach out to these lenders/investors... 

SUMMARY OF WELLS FARGO 'S LATEST LIE/SCANDAL DURING THE STILL ONGOING INVESTIGATION ( OVER 12 MONTHS ) REGARDING THIRD-PARTY LENDERS/INVESTORS I BROUGHT TO AND WAS IGNORED BY WELLS FARGO.. .these third party lenders/investors wanted to provide working capital to my business but they wanted to have a good-faith discussion with Wells Fargo concerning subordinating the collateral. Wells Fargo negligently and callously ignored multiple communication attempts by me to make them aware of these opportunities. One of the lenders, an Opportunity Zone Lender, went out of the way to visit the plant and was happy with what he saw and felt confident I qualified for the funding but needed to have a conversation with Wells Fargo. A second lender, also an Opportunity Zone lender, felt the same way but no reply from Wells Fargo. There were also multiple other third party lenders/investors during this time frame I brought to Wells Fargo and no response from them until XX/XX/XXXX, over 7 months later. 

WELLS FARGO 'S DEFENSE AGAINST THIS FAILURE TO REACH OUT TO THIRD PARTIES... Wells Fargo claims they did not reach out to lenders/investors I brought to them during the still ongoing investigation ( over 12 months ) because I did not sign a borrower 's consent form authorizing them to have the conversation with these third parties. Here is the carefully crafted politically correct response... " The Enterprise Complaints ManagementOffice will not discuss your confidential account information or negotiate settlement terms of the WFSBA Loan with third parties ; all correspondence with 3rd parties is subject to receipt of the Borrowers consent in a form and manner that is acceptable to WFSBA. '' PROBLEM WITH WELLS FARGOS CAREFULLY CRAFTED POLITICALLY CORRECT DEFENSE : I have documented 3 conference calls with Wells Fargo and third party investors/lenders where I was not asked to sign a borrower 's consent form. 

And here is the big issue I have documented 3 conference calls held with Wells Fargo and lenders/investors/third parties and not one time did anyone at Wells Fargo remotely mention anything about a borrowers consent form that I had to sign before the conference call could kickoff. Here are the 3 conference calls with XXXX XXXX with no borrowers consent form : 1.  Conference call on XX/XX/XXXX with an Investor, XXXX XXXX with XXXX, & no mention of a borrowers consent form. 
2. Conference call on XX/XX/XXXX XXXX spoke with XXXX XXXX, a Financial/Banking broker who was working with me to help secure working capital. XXXX did not ask me to sign a Borrowers consent form. 
3. Conference call on XX/XX/XXXX with XXXX & 2 other 3d parties & no one from Wells Fargo asked for a signed Borrowers consent form. 

And then suddenly out of nowhere, the last conference call on XX/XX/XXXX ( ironically right after your XX/XX/XXXX Resolution Letter ) with XXXX & at least 4 other participants, I was required to sign a borrowers consent form ; and like I said, this was a week after Wells Fargos XX/XX/XXXX Resolution Letter stating a borrowers consent form is required in order for Wells Fargo can speak to 3rd parties!!!! Interestingly, this last conference call ( XX/XX/XXXX ) I did not have a signed borrowers consent form for one of the attendees and XXXX would not start the conference call until I emailed a borrowers consent form for this participant. On the call was my customer, XXXX XXXX, and business partner XXXX XXXX. 

SUMMARY... Wells Fargo ruined/destroyed multiple opportunities : a ) Inexcusable delays resulting in major missed opportunities for me to get working capital from 3rd parties, b ) After WF realized they XXXX  up, they asked me to go back & revisit the lenders/investors to see if they are still interested. I did so & was told the Opportunity Zone funding is no longer available ; I sent the emails to WF & no reply c ) After multiple frauds, steering me to predatory lenders, multiple missed opportunities with lenders/investors, a biased one-sided 12 + month-long investigation held in secret, multiple malfeasances, contradictions, inaccurate conclusions in Resolution Letters, catastrophic collateral damage to my business, my employees, my family, my life and on and on... how can Wells Fargo justify liquidation? 

So, after blowing these credible opportunities for me to get working capital, Wells Fargo still refuses to provide working capital and at the same time, by not subordinating the real estate collateral, they effectively are locking out other lenders who want to provide working capital. So I expect the same outcome from every other lender that I try to work with and meanwhile thanks to the shortsighted and selfish views of Wells Fargo, the collateral damage to me, my business and my employees are getting worse every day. By Wells Fargo sitting on revenue-producing collateral and all of the above reasons, they have taken away my ability to generate revenue and earn a living ; as a result, we are forced to shut down until we can find working capital which does not look possible. 

These events are clearly wrongful and demonstrate that Wells Fargo 's decision to push me into a technical default as a way of acquiring the property for their own portfolio or generating default interest and fees which will allow Wells Fargo to maximize the payout of the SBAs 75 % taxpayer-funded guarantee. This clearly looks like a bad faith foreclosure Wells Fargo has backed me against a wall and took away all of my decision-making ability to run my business. So now because of these missed opportunities, Wells Fargo 's next step is to begin liquidation so they can ask the SBA for the 75 % guarantee when this could have been avoided. IMAGINE THAT... WELLS FARGO HAS THE UNMITIGATED GALL TO BEGIN LIQUIDATION AND THEY ARE THE PRIMARY REASON FOR PUTTING MY BUSINESS IN THE DEFAULT SITUATION WE ARE IN! 

Now property taxes ( building, inventory, and equipment ) for the county are due and they could put a lock on the doors any day in the next 30 to 60 days. And to think Wells Fargo would still have the unmitigated gall to even contemplate liquidation when they dropped the ball, is an outrage. Over the last 3 +years since the fraud, I have been treated like XXXX as if I am a criminal with even more harsh treatment during the 12-month one-sided biased investigation conducted in secret with no replies/responses to any of my communication attempts for at least 9 months. And Wells Fargo took away my ability to generate revenue. What is even more troubling is that you still want me to pay all delinquent SBA loan payments with interest, accrued interest and penalties on state and federal withholding taxes while I had working capital lined up but Wells Fargo is directly responsible for blowing this opportunity to obtain working capital from these third party lenders/investors that I worked hard to bring to the table ; the point is I would have been able to get back on track with the working capital from at least one of these opportunity zone lenders ( and yes we are located in an opportunity zone and HUBZone ). And the insulting poor excuse I get after7 + months is that I did not sign a borrowers consent form!!!!... 7+months after I first contacted Wells Fargo about the third party lenders/investors willing to provide working capital, Wells Fargo crafts this poor excuse.

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