Consumer complaint received 2024-10-26
Product: Prepaid card — General-purpose prepaid card
Issue: Problem with a purchase or transfer — Card company isn't resolving a dispute about a purchase or transfer
Company: FIFTH THIRD FINANCIAL CORPORATION (CA)

After nearly a year of unsuccessfully attempting to work with XXXX XXXX  on a very serious matter that took place within their organization, specifically as it relates to multiple XXXX XXXX  opened using my holding company 's entity, my own personal identity ( without my knowledge, consent or actual signature ) and where extensive amounts of embezzlement and fraud took place, I had tried every possible method to get our stolen money back and to file fraud claims. The company, despite dozens of calls to them, would never return calls they promised to return, would not confirm or deny the existence of a fraud department and provided no guidance at all as to how I may even file fraud, I wrote to the COO of the company, XXXX XXXX, to express my concern. He ignored my messages. Only when I wrote to the company 's CEO, XXXX XXXX, who replied the next day, did XXXX finally answer- he was of very little help. I was not aware of this account 's existence. Unbeknownst to me, as I have never made a XXXX XXXX  transaction personally or professionally, had never heard of XXXX XXXX, our company 's former COO opened a fraudulent account using one of our company 's bank accounts and corporate identification. More than {$500000.00} was paid from our companies to this account, where a large portion of the funds were directed to the person who fraudulently opened the account directly or indirectly. He did this by directing funds to his various debit cards, fraudulent XXXX and other cash app accounts, spent money on fast food, parking tickets, travel, parking his car and shopping. This was one of many schemes this person, now being investigate by the FBI, used to steal money from our company. 

The only reason I know about the account was due to a forensic audit upon discovering initial fraud within our bank accounts. It took 2 months to understand where more than {$500000.00} in wires to Fifth Third bank went or what they were for - eventually, we traced these funds through a 2nd party, XXXX XXXX XXXX XXXX, in Illinois, to learn that the money was going to XXXX XXXX. I tried for weeks to gain access to our company 's records and eventually received them after more than 4 dozen phone calls, being disconnected multiple times and never receiving a single phone call back. 

I am the XXXX, XXXX XXXX Member and Majority Shareholder and yet, never signed any agreements nor approved any transactions. Despite speaking to no less than 2 dozen people at their company for the sole purpose of accomplishing 2 things, I was never given one ounce of support or information. 1. Obtaining a copy of whatever agreement exists between XXXX XXXX and My company and 2. Obtaining information on how to report major fraud ( related to the program itself due to the party engaging not being authorized to engage as well as XXXX XXXX 'S lack of oversight to verify the one person who had authority to engage in such a program ). On no less than 15 occasions, I have personally called, been disconnected and placed on hold, each time leading to the exact same conclusion, essentially that, another department, an escalations specialist ( who does not have a phone number ), will be in touch in 24-48 hours... .I have escalated this to a specialist, etc. This has gone on for months and only last month was I finally able to verbally submit a claim with the COO, who only communicated with me because I contacted his boss. By the end of the next week, just a few days later, despite dozens of fraudulent transactions and my facts being extremely organized and clear, I received a letter from XXXX XXXX claiming that essentially nothing was out of the ordinary course of business, which is absolute insanity. Not once have I been contacted by phone, email or other means other than the dozens of calls I received where XXXX was approving transactions for thousands of dollars I didn't know about until it was too late- not once, for what is now 9 months, have I made even one step forward with their team. It is frankly pointless at this stage even expecting to believe a word they say, as nothing ever gets done. Having dealt with nearly every company involved in financials including major banks and even some of the less credible institutions, XXXX XXXX is the sole entity that has literally ignored every attempt to communicate professionally and further, has not remotely shown interest in how their platform is not a secure one which adheres to its own regulations in terms of verifying who you do business with, much less fraud that takes place within the program. While the amount of fraud we have seen is far less than the $ XXXX plus at certain banks, it is a substantial {$500000.00} plus, funds which came from multiple entities under our umbrella. More importantly is that, while the FBI is investigating the criminal aspect of this and are well into the process, a major part of our civil actions are held up by a completely incomprehensible organization 's lack of standards which is frankly, consuming my time and not doing anything to prevent fraud, much less take responsibility for it. I expect more and immediately, thus my letter to you. I truly hope that the nonsensical lack of attention to this will be corrected. There could not be a more clear cut case of fraud possible and it is beyond comprehension how this was ever allowed. The number of promises alone - dozens, where team members promised I would receive contact in 1-2 days, is outrageous. I simply expect our funds back and certainly do hope that they install proper security to avoid this blatant fraud from destroying another person 's business. This has caused tremendous emotional and financial distress.