Consumer complaint received 2024-08-30
Product: Credit card — General-purpose credit card or charge card
Issue: Closing your account — Company closed your account
Company: CITIBANK, N.A. (CA)

My credit card was closed due to my association with my Dad. 
Citi admitted that this was the only reason for closing my account. 
My Dad had had other banks close accounts due to the nature of his business where he deposited large amounts of money orders that were very similar in the amount, e.g. {$1000.00}. 
Before opening the Citi bank account he asked Citi if this would be a problem. 
The employees did what they were trained to do and answered " no ''. 
( My Dad was told by numerous Citi employees that the depositing of large numbers of very similar money orders was OK. For instance, on XX/XX/year>, XXXX , a banker at the XXXX CA XXXX on XXXX told my Dad that depositing $ XXXX of virtually identical money orders every week was Ok. 
If you do not believe Citi is training it employees to tell customers something which is both untrue and very dangerous to the customers, then do what my Dad did and call Citi employees to see if they tell you the same thing that they told my Dad, including the banker who opened his account. ( Citi XX/XX/XXXX Checking # XXXX XXXX XXXX SSN XXXX ) Among my closed credit card accounts were XXXX XXXX, XXXX XXXX XXXX. SSN XXXX Citi called my Dad and asked questions about the large amount of very similar money order deposits.

They chose not to tell him it was a red flag, and he should stop doing it, or his account swould be closed.

When my Dad wrote to Citi to ask how they could justify closing his accounts when he acted based on Citi employee 's advice, their response was to say that they had an absolute right to close credit card accounts. 
The Government has no legal responsibility to regulate in any given area. 
But if they do choose to regulate they must do so in a fair manner. 
Likewise Citi has no responsibility to make promises to customers. 
In the absence of them lying to customers or taking other improper actions, Citi is free to close a credit card for " any reason or no reason '', The issue is not whether Citi can close a credit card or whether they can close bank accounts that they are worried are money laundering. 
The issue is whether Citi can train it employess to lie to customers and then, after the customer reasonably relies on the false information, punish the customer by depriving the customer of extrememeIy valuable credit card assets. 
I request that you : 1 ) Call several random XXXX XXXX Citi bankers to confirm that Cit is mistraining its employees to tell customer that depositng large amounts of virtually identical money orders is OK.

2 ) Require Citi to present appropriate evidence that they have reformed their training procedures to avoid misleading customers, by training employee to tell the truth : deposting large amounts of virtually identical money orders puts you at risk of a shutdown.

3 ) Reopen my closed accounts.

Beyond the specifics of customers being harmed by this practice there is a broader issue : permitting Cit to continue their mistraining sends Citi the message that they can mistrain employees, cause eserious harm to customers in othe rareras and get away with it.

Sending that message is not my idea of why we have the CFPB, hopefully it isi not yours either.

Secondly, I do not know whether the CFPB is wiht Citi punishing me for guilt by association with my Dad. 
I knew nothing about any of this until my accounts were closed. 
If the CFPB is OK with that, then I understand. If not please take appropriate action.