Consumer complaint received 2022-04-14
Company: TRUIST FINANCIAL CORPORATION
State: TN
Product: Money transfer, virtual currency, or money service
Sub-product: Domestic (US) money transfer
Issue: Fraud or scam

Complaint:
On XX/XX/22, I listed a dining set for sale at {$300.00} on XXXX XXXX and was contacted immediately by someone with profile name as " XXXX XXXX '' or XXXX account XXXX asking what is the lowest price I will take for the dining set. I responded the morning of XX/XX/22 and we agreed on a sale price of {$250.00}. They sounded as though they were local and that the husband would pick up the set and they asked to send payment through XXXX because her husband didnt have cash on hand. I told her I had never heard of XXXX and she responded that I can find it in my banking app and that it's safe, fast and offers protection for bank to bank transfers. I found XXXX using my Truist business banking app as a way to transfer money and pay bills, etc. It did not direct me to a third party website leading me to believe it is a service provided by my bank and would offer the same protections. I agreed to the Privacy Policy without reading it thinking it was going to read as having the same protects offered by my bank. There was no alert to warn of the abundance of criminal activity that has been happening through the XXXX platform. It did alert that the transfer could not be reversed, however, I was led to believe the payment would be held pending by XXXX and immediately returned with the {$250.00} we agreed upon for the dining set. 
I set up the account easily though my banking app and " XXXX '' then advised that her {$250.00} payment had been sent and that I would receive an email confirmation from XXXX to show the pending payment, which I did. The email did not look suspect and advised that {$250.00} was pending from " XXXX '' and in order to complete the transaction, a payment of {$300.00} would need to be sent to the payee in order to expand my account and as soon as that was done I would receive a notification and the total amount of {$550.00} would immediately be credited to my account. I thought the process to be a bit weird, but I had an unreasonable amount of confidence due to it happening through my banking app, which I trust to protect my finances. I sent the {$300.00} and " XXXX '' sent me a screen shot showing it had been returned along with her payment of {$250.00} and that I would be receiving another emailing confirming the {$550.00} credit to my account. I never got the email and became suspect of the process so I asked for screen shots on her end showing the payments with confirmation numbers and the last XXXX digits of her account number. I then sent a request for my {$300.00} back to the same account I had just sent a payment to of XXXX XXXX with XXXX account email XXXX, but of course did not receive my money back. I then further investigated the emails from " XXXX '' and found the email address to show as XXXX, which is not a XXXX email. Emails I receive in my mobile app do not show the email address its coming from so the emails appeared to be from XXXX until I later clicked on the XXXX sender to view the email address. 
I immediately contacted my bank and was told the pending payment could not be cancelled, but I could try to dispute it once it posted. I filed a dispute the next morning, XX/XX/22, as soon as the payment posted and advised that I did NOT authorize the payment and I will continue to state it was not authorized due to an imposter pretending to be XXXX and using consumer trust in their banking app as a way to scam money. I authorized the payment to XXXX to be held as pending and immediately returned along with the {$250.00} that this criminal imposter had supposedly paid to me, which was also supposedly being held as pending with XXXX, for my dining set. I did not authorize the payment to be sent to a criminal imposter pretending to be XXXX. The XXXX payment system, being available directly in the Truist banking app as a way to transfer funds, gave myself and ( based on recent reports ) a large number of other consumers an unreasonably high sense of security and protection that is clearly being taken advantage of by criminal organizations. The {$300.00} payment that I sent to XXXX is being disputed as unauthorized due to the circumstances. 
I also filed a complaint through XXXX who states there is no protection policy and they can not /will not get my money back. I filed additional reports on the FBI website and with the FTC to notify of this scam. I also plan on notifying news organizations, local police, and basically anybody that will listen if this is not resolved.

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