Consumer complaint received 2020-09-11
Product: Checking or savings account — Checking account
Issue: Problem with a lender or other company charging your account — Transaction was not authorized
Company: TD BANK US HOLDING COMPANY (VT)

Please note that I recently filed the below complaint with the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency and received a letter from them saying that our complaint does not fall under their jurisdiction, and instead we should file with the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. I hope that you can help. 

On XX/XX/XXXX, I spoke with the Fraud Dept of TD Bank and explained that there was a series of fraudulent charges on my debit card and that I had canceled the card that day. I explained that the majority of the charges were made by XXXX and that I had spoken with XXXX XXXX  on the phone and that they agreed that someone must have acquired my debit card number and was making fraudulent charges to my account. 

They were able to reimburse me for 19 of these charges within 3-5 days, but for the other 59 fraudulent charges, XXXX directed me to seek reimbursement from my bank since it was clearly a case of fraud. ( The 19 that were reimbursed were not fraud ; they were mistakes on the part of XXXX ). For the 59 fraudulent charges, the XXXX rep insisted that I need to contest these charges directly with my bank since the fraud was committed on a TD Bank Checking account bank card. 

For the past three months I have been trying to do this and have had very little success. TD Bank initially gave me a provisional credit in the amount of {$650.00} ( the total of the remaining fraudulent charges ) while they started an investigation. Within two weeks I received two nearly identical letters from the Claims & Disputes Department, each stating a slightly different reason for deciding that they would be reversing the credit of {$650.00} on my account. One said that I had already been reimbursed by XXXX, which is ( as  noted above ) decidedly untrue ( only a very small portion of the charges had been reimbursed, and we are seeking the remainder to be reimbursed by the bank ). And the other simply stated that fraud did not occur, which is also completely untrue and was even confirmed to us by XXXX. 

Both letters also stated that I have a right to request and obtain the documentation that the bank used to make this determination. 

Since then, I have tried on multiple occasions to obtain the above-mentioned documentation or some kind of explanation as to why this was determined not to be fraud, AND to start an appeal process. The fraud department has not been responsive despite my many attempts to reach them both by phone and through my local branch customer support person, XXXX XXXX, who has tried on multiple occasions to get through to the Fraud / Claims & Disputes ( by phone and email ) but has had no response to date. It has now been 3 months since my initial complaint and request for reimbursement, and today, we received another email stating that they would not reimburse me and stated that it should be XXXX that reimburses me for the fraud on my card, not them. Since XXXX made it clear that it was not their responsibility, and that the Banks are responsible for fraudulent charges to their checking accounts, we are left not knowing what course of action to take next. 

Last week, myself and my caregiver ( who has been supporting me throughout this process ) reached out to Vermont Legal Aid for help, and the lawyer that is helping me instructed me to report this to your institution. I am XXXX XXXX XXXX, Im on social security and XXXX ( XXXX ) and have extremely limited resources so this act of fraud has been particularly challenging to me. I hope that your organization can help. 

Thank you for any help that you can offer. 

Sincerely, XXXX XXXX