Consumer complaint received 2020-08-18
Company: JPMORGAN CHASE & CO.
State: CA
Product: Credit card or prepaid card
Sub-product: General-purpose credit card or charge card
Issue: Problem with a purchase shown on your statement
Sub-issue: Card was charged for something you did not purchase with the card

Complaint:
I have been a high net worth customer of JPMorgan Chase Bank with a relationship spanning over 30+ years. In addition, I am a XXXX female XXXX with a 25 year career spent working at the top in XXXX XXXX and XXXX XXXX, ( with professional relationships extending to the Board of Directors of JP Morgan Chase ). Therefore, I have been shocked and appalled at the unprofessional, unfair, and illegal treatment that I have received at the hands of JPMorgan Chase, and specifically, the Chase Executive Office and Chase Credit Card Services in the handling of fraudulent charges made on two of my Chase Credit Cards by a former employee of mine. If someone with my stature, expertise, C-suite relationships and access can not get fair treatment from a financial institution like Chase, then the everyday citizen has literally no hope. Chase 's actions have exposed the ugly underbelly of a financial institution in total control of the situation and uses their power to avoid protecting their customers, nevermind that they are legally bound by fiduciary duty to do so and investigate any disputes in a thorough, professional manner. 

Here are the pertinent details : On XX/XX/XXXX, my husband and I discovered that a trusted employee of ours ( our House Manager, who is the daughter of our now-former long-term Housekeeper ) had been stealing from us for the past 20 months. In addition to bank and check fraud, stealing physical items and cash from our home, and identity fraud, she and her family members were making unauthorized charges on two of our Chase Credit Cards without our knowledge or permission. She was actively concealing XXXX XXXX XXXX of dollars of fraudulent purchases by setting up fake Amazon accounts, XXXX accounts, etc. and mirroring our household purchases in a way that made it very difficult to discover. When we discovered the fraud, we went immediately to the XXXX XXXX Police Department ( XXXX ), and were fortunate enough to have a relationship with the Deputy Chief of Police who put us in touch with our local division 's fraud detectives. Subsequently, given the complexity, scope, and dollar amount of the fraud, the bulk of our financial case was assigned to the XXXX XXXX XXXX ( XXXX ) of the XXXX. Initially, we were instructed IN WRITING by the XXXX detectives handling our case NOT to notify our insurance companies or financial institutions of the fraud until the XXXX had determined a final total loss amount given that they had to review over 1,000 pieces of evidence of the fraud in the form of receipts, statements, texts admitting the fraud, etc. 

This is a COMPLICATED case with a lot of moving parts, as evidenced by the XXXX 's documentation and over 1,000 pieces of evidence. As it relates to Chase, the case involves the massive fraudulent use of two Chase credit cards : On the first card, the employee was NEVER an unauthorized user on the cardwhich is indisputableand therefore the investigation was simple in that she was never authorized to make purchases on the card and was never in physical possession of the credit card. Instead, unbeknownst to me, she had stolen the card number from my wallet and was using the card number, expiration date, and CVV information to make ONLINE purchases only, the bulk of which were through a separate Amazon account that she set up in her name and linked our Chase credit card to. She not only fraudulently purchased goods outright on the unauthorized, stolen card, but also used hundreds of thousands of our Chase Ultimate Rewards points to purchase ( or offset some of the purchase ) of goods on Amazon. 

The second Chase card was more complicated, because our employee WAS an authorized user on the credit card and had a physical credit card with her name on it that she was authorized to use in order to purchase groceries and other household items for our home. However, rather that making authorized purchases for us as part of her house manager job, she was passing her physical credit card to members of her family to use ( which is being investigated by XXXX ) ; therefore those users were unauthorized to use the card, and they were therefore clearly making fraudulent purchases. The Chase Executive Office and Chase Fraud Dept said that their investigators would be reaching out to the retailers involved to investigate the charges made on that card, and to determine who, in fact, was using the credit card at the time of purchase. If it was our employee making the charges, then those charges would not be reversed since she was personally an authorized user on the card ; however, if she was not the one making the purchases, those charges would be both fraudulent and unauthorized, and would be reversed permanently. 

Given the astronomical dollar amounts associated with the fraud, and after waiting for over 30 days for the XXXX to start their investigation, I approached the XXXX and asked them to allow me to contact Chase and our other financial institutions to begin to recover our money, given the tremendous financial burden the fraudulent activity had created for my family. The XXXX agreed, telling us that we needed to make sure Chase Fraud investigators did not " tip off '' the perpetrator, and that the fraud department should work in concert with the XXXX, as they too [ Chase ] were victims of the fraud. 

On XX/XX/XXXX, after having been given the OK by the XXXX to approach Chase, I called and wrote an email to XXXX XXXX, EVP of Chase Card Services, copying XXXX XXXX, Co-President and COO of JPMorgan Chase and CEO of the Consumer & Community Banking division explaining the situation. I approached XXXX and XXXX given my 25 year career in the financial services industry and given several relationships at the top with JPMorgan Chase executives, including two of their Board members. 

Shortly after my email was sent, in early XXXX I received a call from " XXXX '' in the Chase Executive Office ( no last names are given even when requested ). When we finally connected ( he was out of town and unreachable for at least 2 weeks ), I explained the entire situation to XXXX in granular detail and he asked me for any supporting documentation, including the XXXX case information. After assembling the information into an organized set of documents as XXXX had requested, on XX/XX/XXXX, I sent him seven separate emails with all of the documentation from the XXXX along with the disputed charges on both Chase Credit cards. I then sent XXXX an 8th email on XX/XX/XXXX with a copy of all of the documentation regarding the Chase Ultimate Rewards Points that the perpetrator had used to fraudulently purchase goods on Amazon account using my Chase credit cards/Rewards Points. When I did not hear back from XXXX, I called him to follow-up a week later, and he informed me that I needed to call the Chase Fraud line directly to report the fraudulent charges to them so that they could reverse them on both credit card accounts directly. 

When I called the Chase Fraud department, they instructed me to FAX a copy of all of the disputed, fraudulent charges to them which I did since they could not accept emails from outside parties. After following up on the fax over the next two weeks, I was informed that Chase never received my fax. The representative I spoke with suggested that I go into a Chase Branch to have them send the fax " intra-Chase '' so that we would get a confirmation number and be able to track the fax. On XX/XX/XXXX, I went into my local Chase retail branch and spoke with a helpful Chase " Relationship Banker, XXXX, who assisted me in sending two faxes detailing the disputed charges on both credit cards, one 80 pages and the other 20 pages, to the Chase Fraud department fax line. She kept the confirmation sheets that the faxes had sent, along with the fax number they were sent from ( the branch ). When I called to follow-up on the faxes with the disputed charges within the week, I was told that the faxes go to a separate Chase Fax Dept. and it can take up to ten business days for them to be reflected, but that with the XXXX holidays approaching, and several bank holidays pending, I should wait until after the first of the year. 

On XX/XX/XXXX I called the Chase Fraud Department again and was told they had not received them. On XX/XX/XXXX I called again and spoke to a man named XXXX who informed me that my case was being reassigned, but that there was no record of any disputed charges in their system, and no record of a fax being received. At this point I went back to the branch and enlisted XXXX help again ; this time she called the Chase Fraud Department directly and asked XXXX whether she could send Chase Fraud a copy of the disputed charges via email ( along with all of the supporting documentation for my case ) if I emailed them to her. Chase Fraud agreed to accept the information from her since it was internal Chase -to-Chase email, and on XX/XX/XXXX I forwarded to XXXX 11 emails which she then forwarded to Chase Fraud Dept. The emails not only included the disputed fraudulent charges on both credit cards, but all of the supporting documentation that had already been sent to the Chase Executive Office. 

During the last week of XXXX, I called the Chase Fraud Dept. again and spoke with a man named XXXX, who informed me that they had received all of the disputed charges on both cards emailed to them by XXXX. XXXX informed me that a Fraud dept. employee named XXXX had received our emails with all of the disputed charges, and that he would finish inputting the fraudulent charges in the system by the end of the week. XXXX assured me that once the charges were inputted into the system, my case would be assigned to a Fraud Investigator who would reach out to me directly to hear all of the details of my case, and would serve as my point person throughout their investigation, including speaking the the XXXX XXXX detective in charge of my case. 

Around this time I received a voicemail back from XXXX in the Chase Executive Office saying that he had reviewed my case and would suggest that I pursue the case as a civil matter, asking the perpetrator to make restitution for the fraudulent charges. I immediately called XXXX in the Chase Executive Office to ask why they would have made that determination, but was told that he no longer worked in the division and that my case was going to be reassigned to another individual, but that they did not know the name of the person it was being reassigned to at that stage. I explained all of the other things I had been doing with the Chase Fraud Dept. in the meantime. I was told that I would receive a call from the Chase Executive Office shortly with the name of the newly assigned investigator/case lead. 

After having XXXX XXXXXXXX on XX/XX/XXXX, I spent the first few weeks of XXXX recovering. By the last week of XX/XX/XXXX, after making several additional phone calls to the Chase Fraud Dept., none of the disputed charges had shown up in the system. I reached out to XXXX again, and she reached out to XXXX and his supervisors through Chase internal channels. At this stage everyone was very apologetic, and XXXX promised to get all of the disputed charges into the system by the end of that week. Sometime shortly thereafter, all of the disputed charges FINALLY showed up as credits on my credit card statements. This was a tremendous relief, and as soon as I saw the credits hit, I called the Chase Fraud Dept. and the Chase Executive Office to find out who had been assigned as the investigator for my case. To my dismay, NO ONE had been assigned. They simply credited the amounts and then did not investigate them. 

Just as soon as I was credited for the disputed charges, those charges were reversed. I was not called by an investigator at any time, and the only communication I received was a letter from XXXX in the Fraud Department ( XXXX ) XXXX, Ext. XXXX saying that she had completed her review and that I am responsible for all of the disputed transactions because You received benefit from this transaction. No other information. When I called her to ask more information, I spoke with XXXX in the Chase Fraud department ( extension XXXX ) who told me that XXXX was no longer handling my account, but that if I was dissatisfied with the outcome he could reopen the case and take a look at it. I re-explained the entire situation again to XXXX, particularly focusing on the UNAUTHORIZED credit card which is exceedingly straightforward and indisputable, and outlining the disputed charges and encouraging him to speak to the XXXX and review all of the documentation I had provided. XXXX came back to me after XXXX weeks to say that he was backing up the XXXX findings, and that they had made their ruling based on two FACTUALLY INCORRECT findings : first, that our former employee was an authorized user on both credit cards ( she was not! ) and second, that I had waited until XXXX of XXXX to report the fraud and attempt to have the charges investigated and reversed ( which is not true and evidenced in dozens of emails dating back to the fall of XXXX ). I told him that neither of those facts were true and pointed him in the direction of the evidence to the contrary ( very simple to find in this case ), but he then told me he couldnt do any more and that I would have to request an appeal if I wanted anyone to continue to investigate it. He seemed VERY unprofessional and unknowledgeable, so I asked him how long he had worked in the Chase Executive Office..his answer  was less than 3 months. He had NO IDEA how to actually investigate my case. I told him I did want to appeal, at which point he told me that he was passing my case on to another, more experienced investigator who would call me shortly. 

By this point, XXXX, COVID was in full swing. When I would call to follow-up I would simply get referred to the online system, with a recorded notice instructing me to email them at XXXX. On XX/XX/XXXX I finally received a final voicemail from a woman named XXXX in the Chase Card Services Executive Office saying that she received word that I did not agree with my disputed charges being declined, but that because all of the charges were being made by an authorized user there would be no additional assistance Chase could provide and that therefore I was liable for all charges and that they recommend I pursue it as a civil matter with my former employee. Obviously, this is absolutely NOT TRUE, and easily verifiable by looking at the basic cardholder agreement and list of authorized users on each credit card. After returning XXXX call about half a dozen times and leaving detailed messages, I have never received a call back. 

This unconscionable treatment by Chase comes without regard to the XXXX XXXX XXXX XXXX ( XXXX ) evidence, an admission in writing on the part of the former employee detailing her commission of the crimes, and findings by the investigative divisions of other insurance and banking institutions ( XXXX XXXX  and XXXX XXXX ) clearly acknowledging the factual extent of the fraud and making appropriate restitution under the law. 

Only JPMorgan Chase has refused to actively investigate the case. To date, I have made DOZENS of documented calls to Chase, and have sent well over 30 detailed emails to individuals in the Chase Executive Office, Chase Fraud Department, Chase Fraud Recovery ( both inbound call teams and investigators ), and Chase Branch over the course of 11 months. During that time, Chase has been giving me the run around for months they refused to actually assign an investigator to my account when I was assured repeatedly that would be the next step. The investigator was supposed to be someone I could speak with who would serve as a point person for my case : someone who was accountable for communicating where things stand with regard to my case, whom I could give all of the evidence to, and whom I could put in touch with the XXXX detective in charge of my case. 
Instead, every time I called I had to start over from the beginning, each call taking well over an hour since I could never reach the same person twice. The only Chase employee who has shown any desire to actually provide me with assistance and who clearly understands that I am being treated unfairly by Chase is XXXX. At this stage I am at a loss with regard to next steps, other than to file this complaint with the CFPB, hire and attorney, and sue them over the breach of fiduciary duty to protect my interests as a cardholder in keeping with their stated financial practices.

Company response to consumer: Closed with explanation