Consumer complaint received 2024-07-23
Product: Checking or savings account — Checking account
Issue: Problem with a lender or other company charging your account — Transaction was not authorized
Company: Chime Financial Inc (AL)

I recently lost my phone, and while it was lost someone else had access to it without my permission, and signed up for XXXX free trials on my phone without my knowledge. I didnt know there was a free trial on my phone until XXXX days ago when I was charged {$140.00} from XXXX  XXXX After getting the charge I immediately cancelled the subscription, and contacted apple and the owners of the XXXX apps to ask for a refund. 

Unfortunately my refund requests were immediately rejected by both XXXX and the owners of the apps. 

As my last resort I contacted my bank ( Which is chime ) to try to file an unauthorized purchase dispute for a chargeback. 

But unfortunately during the process of explaining what happened to my bank, the bank was apathetic, and insensitive to my situation, and basically told me in a very rude way that me losing my phone, and a random person using it to purchase something without my permission does not count as an unauthorized purchase, and that I should have been more responsible with my phone They also added that there was no error on the merchants end for the billing, so my dispute cant be filed. 

All of that is really confusing me, because the last time I checked, when someone uses your credit card to purchase something without your permission, that is an an unauthorized purchase. 

Also its important to inform you that the money used for the purchase of this app was the last bit of spending money that I had, and it was meant for urgent bills, and food, so I need that money back as soon as possible, because I dont have anything else. 

Also I want to add that my account was set up to receive text alerts for all new purchase attempts, so that I would have a chance to accept or decline the transaction, but this time they failed to send me a text alert, but if they would have did this then this whole situation could have been avoided. 

I told the bank every thing I wrote above, and the agents, including the male supervisor, showed no empathy for me at all. They basically just told me in their own words to suck it up, and be more responsible. So basically theyre ok with me losing the last bit of money that I had! I cant believe people on this earth can be so cruel to one another. 

I want to add that I suffer from XXXX XXXX XXXX XXXX thoughts, and because of all of this, it has taken a turn for the worse, and XXXX XXXX XXXX XXXX XXXX XXXX XXXX XXXX XXXX XXXX XXXX XXXX XXXX XXXX XXXX XXXX XXXX XXXX XXXX XXXX 

I thought people were more empathetic than this and I feel extremely hopeless. I just cant understand how a bank that Ive supported, and recommended for years are all of a sudden refusing to grant me a simple chargeback dispute for an obvious unauthorized purchase. 

My money was basically stolen from me, and the fact that XXXX, and the owner of the apps are refusing to grant me a refund for money that was stolen from me is bad enough, but when your own bank does not have your back when your money is stolen, is enough to make you question if you want to continue to live in a world like this! 

We as people all have a right to a simple refund, especially if a subscription was cancelled literally seconds after an unauthorized purchase was made. 

Im only trying to get a refund right now, but I truly wish that this company would get sued, and never operate again. They clearly have no empathy, and care for their customers. 

Whats really disappointing to me is that when this company first started they were very empathetic and actually went above and beyond to help its customers when things like this happened, but as they grew to become more successful, theyre starting to feel like they cant be touched, so theyre treating people any kind of way, because they feel they can get away with it. 

Unfortunately that seems to be common with a lot of companies that when they first start out, they treat customers very nice, because they need the business from the customer, but when they become successful, they treat customers like trash that they can discard because they now have so many. And this is exactly what this company is doing right now.