Consumer complaint received 2024-06-25
Product: Credit card — General-purpose credit card or charge card
Issue: Problem with a purchase shown on your statement — Credit card company isn't resolving a dispute about a purchase on your statement
Company: BANK OF AMERICA, NATIONAL ASSOCIATION (MA)

Bank of America has been entirely unhelpful and uncooperative in assisting me with recovering fraudulent charges made on my credit card. On the early morning of XX/XX/XXXX, my Bank of America XXXX XXXX XXXX left my possession and I did not notice. As a frequent XXXX XXXX user, I spent the rest of the day using that credit card from my phone and did not open my wallet ; therefore I did not realize my card was missing. 

On XX/XX/XXXX, at around XXXX XXXX, I looked at my credit card account and the recent charges on it and saw that there were XXXX fraudulent purchases totaling {$960.00} that occurred in the XXXX XXXX area of XXXX primarily on XX/XX/XXXX. I spent that entire day in XXXX. Once I realized my card was stolen, I immediately called Bank of America to lock my card and report the charges as fraud. I spoke to the first customer representative where I went through the nine charges that were fraud. I was told that a fraud specialist would need to handle the fraud claim since there were multiple fraudulent transactions ; I was transferred to the fraud department. In the middle of the transfer, the call hung up. I called back again and spoke with a different representative where I once again went through the fraud transactions, despite telling them that I was told a fraud specialist would need to handle the claim. After going through the transactions again, she confirmed my position and transferred my call. A fraud department representative answered and I then went through the nine separate transactions for a third time. I was told that my claim was successfully submitted. 

On XX/XX/XXXX, I received an update about my claim that stated they were unable to pay it. The document stated that " We made this decision because : The merchant provided documentation confirming you received the merchandise or service. '' Following this I called back Bank of America to dispute this. On the call I learned that an incorrect, non-fraudulent purchase that I never at any point claimed to be fraud was included on the claim. I asked for that purchase to be removed from the claim. I also asked for the documentation provided by the merchant that confirmed I received the goods or service, but no document was found or sent to me. The claim was resubmitted. 

On XX/XX/XXXX, I received another update that again said they could not pay the claim. This document provided a list of the fraudulent transactions, and it STILL contained the non-fraud transaction that I asked to be removed. I called Bank of America once again and asked for the transaction to be remove from the account. During this interaction, the representative also informed me that the claim type filed was incorrect and was not accurate if I had lost the physical card. The claim was resubmitted. 

On XX/XX/XXXX, the claim was once again denied. Again, the document stated that " We made this decision because : The merchant provided documentation confirming you received the merchandise or service. '' When asked for the documentation or other information used to come to this decision, none could be provided to me. I called and asked for the claim to be resubmitted. 

On XX/XX/XXXX, the claim was denied again. Additionally, this document once again had the incorrect, non-fraudulent purchase on the claim. The document stated that " We made this decision because : The merchant provided documentation confirming you received the merchandise or service. '' This documentation or other information was not provided to me. I called and asked for the claim to be resubmitted. 

On XX/XX/XXXX, the claim was denied once again. The document again stated that " We made this decision because : The merchant provided documentation confirming you received the merchandise or service. '' This documentation or other information was not provided to me. I called the representative within the fraud department and was told that this decision was made because : 1 ) I had used XXXX to use the card to pay for purchase while the fraud was occurring 2 ) I had opened my bank app on XX/XX/XXXX during the fraud events, but had not called to report fraud at the time. My rationale and defense for this is : I did not open my wallet the entire day I was using XXXX where I would have noticed the card to be missing. Additionally, when I open my bank app, the first accounts I see are for my checking and savings account. To see the charges for my credit card, I would have to deliberately scroll to the bottom on the page and then click on the account to see the charge details. I had used the app to XXXX someone via my checking account ; therefore I would not have seen the fraudulent purchases. I also did not receive proof that I had looked at the detailed credit charges of my account when the fraudulent purchases would have been present. I asked for the claim to be re-submitted. 

As a Bank of America XXXX since XXXX, I am extremely disappointed with this customer service and assistance with this issue. I have spent hours dealing with this and speaking to Bank of America employees, yet I still have not received a satisfactory resolution. I have not been asked to provide, at any point, any supporting evidence or documentation that confirms I did not make these purchases. Time and time again, I asked for the evidence that Bank of America is using to come to the determination that fraud did not occur and have not received anything. I believe that the initial issues associated with the claim ( incorrect non-fraudulent transaction and incorrect claim type ), are actively hurting resubmissions of the claim to this day, despite being problems that were not my fault. While the representatives that I have spoken with have been kind, a small handful have actually been helpful and some I believe have hurt my claim. I have filed a report to the police department to investigate this fraud and am attaching a photo of the initial intake form. I am working to get the full police report.