Consumer complaint received 2020-12-21
Company: BANK OF AMERICA, NATIONAL ASSOCIATION
State: CA
Product: Credit card or prepaid card
Sub-product: Government benefit card
Issue: Trouble using the card
Sub-issue: Problem using the card to withdraw money from an ATM

Complaint:
I have a Bank of America EDD debit card from CA EDD, but since XXXX of 2020, Bank of America has done everything possible to make my life miserable and they continue to do so. They have unlawfully debited thousands of dollars from my account without permission, blocked my card on more than one occasion, and according to EDD possibly 'lost ' 2 X {$300.00} that should have been credited me from the president 's executive order commonly referred to as 'Lost Wages Supplemental Payments ', even thought EDD has told me in no uncertain terms that the payments were sent to my debit card, but thanks to BofA 's shenanigans, never were given me. BofA of course denied it. On XX/XX/2020. BofA sent me a letter stating that I would be refunded for a claim, {$920.00} plus fees, within two business days, meaning by XX/XX/XXXX. I was to be refunded money that was never dispensed by an ATM plus bank fees. It never came and I only got the fees refunded. This is par for the course for BofA who are typically incompetent on most days anyway. But I was even more angered because after I queried them about it, and after I faxed them several letters, and after more verbal promises that I would be refunded within days, they retaliated against me by including me in a 'suspected fraudster ' letter to EDD . Since I was already well known now to their claims office, to their executive office, and to Enterprise Resolutions, it is impossible for BofA to have thought that I was a fraudster and they know exactly who I am that I am a victim. Why would they promise a refund to someone they thought was a fraudster? By then they already knew vert well who I was, but they have done this anyway, I suspect just to make my life harder around XXXX, and to ensure as much difficulty as they could. Needless to say, EDD has confirmed that they never suspected anything out of the ordinary with me or my claim, and that it was only because of BofA who requested verification without a single shred of evidence, that I have no money several days before XXXX. EDD has already validated my identity and income rather efficiently and has told BofA to unfreeze my account, but BofA has not done this yet nor have they credited me the outstanding {$920.00}. 

It has been reported in the news why BofA is doing all this. Due to high levels of fraud Bank of America is making life difficult for genuine unemployed citizens of California like me, who have nothing to do with fraud but have been the victims of fraud themselves or as in my case, did nothing wrong other than file a legitimate dispute claim as is permissible by Visa and BofA. BofA A have claimed to have suffered losses from fraud and therefore are now clawing back money from legitimate claims like mine, this even though BofA made money on me from fees and is a highly profitable bank. BofA have have said in a letter to state legislators, all of whom have constituents who are upset about having money literally stolen from them by the bank that : 'Identifying legitimate claimants from among the fraudulent claimants is time-consuming and challenging. '' That may very well be, but that is a rather feeble excuse, especially when they have been contracted to do exactly what they say is 'challenging '. But even worse BofA already know that I am a just an aggrieved customer who has nothing to do with fraud. BofA as policy have right from the beginning made very little attempt to 'identify ' whether I was filing a legitimate claim or not as they basically unfairly started casting aspersions of my guilt without so much a a telephone call from as far back as XXXX of 2020. It was only after I made formal complaints to their executive office that a bank operative even bothered to contact me in the first place, meaning their claims office has never once asked me a single question in order to determine whether the claims were legitimate or not. They have told the press that they have been defrauded by scammers, that may very well be, but they should not knowingly take it out on unemployed citizens like me nor should they steal money from victims like me, which is what they have done. And there is no surprise that BofA is clueless about claims because their computers seem to make determinations based on fraud algorithms that are often wrong. All of this has led to a comedy of errors, such as last month when i was told by their Enterprise Resolutions team to refile a claim, I waited on hold for over three hours only to get disconnected. I finally filed it on the next call which took two more hours of hold time. I was therefore unhappy to find out that after all that, BofA cancelled my claims again me anyway, as they unfairly suspected fraud. I had to do this twice more before they finally stopped their computers from cancelling my claim and automatically sending out letters stating that my claim was suspicious, which is incredible since they never bother doing an investigation in the first place. They had finally agreed to pay the single outstanding claim in that letter of XX/XX/XXXX and so I thought this was all done, but instead they asked EDD to verify me, and blocked my card, and never refunded me for that claim as they had said they would. Bank of America is incompetent and continue to be rather useless as a middleman between EDD and payment of my claim.

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