Consumer complaint received 2018-12-11
Product: Mortgage — Home equity loan or line of credit (HELOC)
Issue: Trouble during payment process — 
Company: M&T BANK CORPORATION (NY)

I first opened my HELOC around XX/XX/XXXX and at that time the bank required that the payments be debited from the primary checking account. Needless to say, I never missed a payment or been late on a payment because the money was always automatically debited from my account. 

A couple of months ago, I had an issue with my debit card so I called the bank to rectify the situation and I was told that my account had been closed. I thought this was a mistake so the next day I went into the branch and the Customer Service Rep told me that they didn't have any information and that I had to call customer service. I went home called customer service who redirected me back to the branch. I went back to the Branch and this time I asked to speak with a manager. After about an hour of phone calls to the " back-office '' I was told that someone would get back to me by the end of the week.

I followed up two days later and the branch manager asked if I had received any notices in the mail. I let her know that I had since moved to a new address and she explained that she had never seen anything like this but, it looked like the accounts were closed out and checks were issued to my old address. I immediately asked why and she went on to explain that there was no information in the system and that she could no longer access the account number because the accounts had been closed out. 

Without any explanation or reason, my accounts were closed due to bank procedures. No one could give an explanation. My web banking was shut down and I was told it was because I had closed out my account relationship. Once I received the official checks I went to another institution to open up new accounts. It took a couple of weeks for my funds to become available because of the check amounts and because it was a new account. 

During this process of switching banks and not having access to any of my account and web payment history I was unable to keep up with all of my automatic debits. I had no idea what was paid and what had cleared my accounts prior to the closing. I had all my bills deducted from that checking account which I had for over 15 years. There was collectively over {$10000.00} in my various checking and savings accounts. I also, had about {$8000.00} in equity on my HELOC. 

In XXXX, I received my first phone call from the bank and it was in regards to a collection effort which was weird to me because I had never received any calls or heard anything about my loan or any of my accounts. I had made weekly visits to the bank to deposit money and withdraw cash periodically. I even made teller transactions and at no point did anyone say that they had been trying to reach me or update my account information. The collections department informed me that I was 76 days late on my HELOC and as a result I no longer had access to the Line of Credit. My response was why didn't you inform of this earlier before you closed out my Line of Credit. Why did I not receive a phone call before all my accounts were closed and the Rep on the call told me that he's in collections and he didn't know that my accounts were all closed out and he transferred me to the mortgage department. Once transferred I asked why no one called me to make me aware that all of my accounts were going to be closed and why no one ever explained what happened to me. She went on to explain that there is a Federal Regulation that requires the bank to update customer information and they send out letters every 5-years and that if they dont get a response it triggers an alert and the process begins to close out the account. I explained to her that I had moved from that address but I still owned the property. Then I asked why they don't just call people to update the information and she said that unfortunately that department just sends letters. She went on to say that usually people receive the letters and then call the 800-number or come into the branch to rectify the issue or update the information. 

I told her that I never received the letters and I thought that this process was unfair because I did not receive any phone calls until all my accounts were closed and my HELOC had been rescinded and my Line had been closed. She went on to apologize for the confusion as she could see that I never missed a payment since the inception of the Loan and that there was nothing she could do once the accounts were all closed out. I asked her for the payment information and made arrangements to send in a payment within the next 10-days.

This was a horrible experience for me! I never been so scared or embarrassed. My credit score was severely impacted by this whole ordeal because of all the missed payments! I don't think it is not right for the bank to be able to close out your account ( s ) without at least calling you first. The first phone call I received from the bank was 76-days after my last HELOC payment was automatically debited from my checking account. Collections had my phone number so, its hard for me to believe that the branch or the front-office did have it. I was told that all of this could have been avoided if they were able to update my information in XXXX. My phone number never changed. I've had the same cell phone number for 18 years. Please HELP!!