Consumer complaint received 2024-01-21
Product: Checking or savings account — Checking account
Issue: Problem with a lender or other company charging your account — Transaction was not authorized
Company: BANK OF AMERICA, NATIONAL ASSOCIATION (NY)

I was notified that, after over XXXX months, my fraud claim with my bank, Bank of America, was ineligible for fraud protection and a permanent credit in the amount of {$2200.00}. I was, however, accredited {$23.00} from this same claim. 

Before I begin explaining why this resolution is illegitimate on their part and overall inaccurate, Id like to begin by giving you background on both myself and the fraud claim. Ive also done extensive research on the remote server used to compromise my phone and the fraudulent customer service line over the past XXXX months. In this letter, I include citations from multiple articles regarding this type of fraudulent scheme, as well as my phone records as I requested from my service provider. As a disclaimer, my service provider ( XXXX ) stated that it can not provide a more intrusive phone record detailing the exchange due to privacy reasons, but I will reference each call made on XX/XX/XXXX which led to me being a victim of fraud. 

Ive been a customer of Bank of America ( BOA ) for 10 years, since I was XXXX XXXX XXXX. This is the only bank account Ive ever held and XXXX XXXX XXXX XXXX XXXX XXXX XXXX XXXX XXXX XXXX 

I am XXXX XXXX XXXX and I XXXX from XXXX XXXX XXXX in the spring with a XXXX XXXX XXXX XXXX. I was awarded tuition coverage due to having a very difficult financial situation ( single family household ). I took out several student loans as cushion for my monthly rent as a student, on top of working up to XXXX hours a week at minimum wage jobs. Thus, as I hope to express to you, I am in student loan debt of over {$20.00} XXXX XXXX  but have worked diligently to pull myself out. Currently, I am so grateful and proud to have been awarded a XXXX position at XXXXXXXX XXXX, which is my first salaried job. Everything I have worked for thus far amounts to this achievement, and I hope to continue my schooling and eventually have a high paying job to help retire my family and get us out of financial debt. I am only given about {$45.00} XXXX a year prior to taxes, but I have never been more grateful to be recognized for my achievements and be able to pursue my studies. I know that at the end of this 5 year program, I will be able to pay off my debt, have a good job, and no longer have to live paycheck to paycheck. 

It is my first semester of my XXXX so I just moved to XXXX XXXX XXXX. As stated before, this is my first salary job, my biggest expense is my monthly rent which is about {$1500.00}. I have never spent more than {$300.00} on myself in XXXX sitting in my life, I do not have the luxury to spend money. I am working tirelessly to set aside money to pay my student loans monthly to help alleviate the burden of my debt. I was even awarded an extra {$5.00} XXXXXXXX XXXX XXXX fellowship by XXXX XXXX  this year, due to my academic and personal merit, I planned to use all that extra money for my loans. As for most people, my financial situation defines me sometimes. I have to be careful with my money, I have always understood the value and importance of the money I earn because without it, I simply can not survive. I would never compromise the money I use to keep myself sheltered, fed and clothed, especially not when I just moved to a new city by myself and started my dream job. 

With that being said, I want to discuss the fraud claim itself : how I ended up in this situation and why it is both unjust and inaccurate to deny my claim. I have an XXXX in which I write all of my notes for my classes and research ; it took me a year to pay off but by XXXX of this year, I fully paid it off and have been using it for my XXXX  research since starting my new position. On Monday, XX/XX/XXXX, right before my midterm exams, my XXXX stopped working and I understandably freaked out as all of my notes were stored in it. I had meetings and presentations which depended on these notes. I spoke to my university advisors and friends who all advised me to call XXXX XXXX, a support line set up for XXXX products. Ive done this before for phone/macbook/airpod issues and knew Id be able to get some help. I googled the phone number for apple support, and XXXX websites popped up under support.apple.com, XXXX sponsored and XXXX not. The website templates and layout were identical and I made sure to check this ; you can even see for yourself if you XXXX this. So I chose the first XXXX, the sponsored site, as I believed a sponsored site must be more legitimate. I called the phone number ( XXXX ( XXXX ) XXXX ) and was helped by a woman who sympathized with my situation. This is provided in the phone record attached ( under my number XXXX ) at XXXX XXXX on Monday XX/XX/XXXX to a toll-free number for XXXX minutes. She went on to explain that a lot of XXXX are having this problem due to the new software update, and that shed be happy to assist me with fixing my XXXX after XXXX ID XXXX This is a standard procedure, Ive had my Apple ID verified by XXXX many times before. She started to suggest ways for me to get the XXXX working in the meantime ; I genuinely thought she was helping me. XXXX minutes into the call, she said that I had multiple fraudulent charges on my XXXX XXXX XXXX account ( which is used to pay for my XXXX  ) amounting to almost {$2000.00}. She began frantically exclaiming that she needs to verify my identity so as to prevent further charges on my account. She instructed me to download XXXX on my XXXX, I repeatedly asked why and she said that she gains verification to my XXXX ID that way. 

I downloaded the app, I really just needed help with my XXXX as all of my work depended on it, and I became increasingly worried about the so-called suspicious charges on my account. She was able to then display a screen on my phone with a negative {$1500.00} balance in my XXXX Credit card, I really began to panic. I had no idea that this app was a remote server and she was able to compromise my phone and manipulate me into believing there was a problem. After downloading the app, she asked me to use XXXX or cashapp to send money to my coworker, who was sitting right next to me. I kept asking why, she said that my XXXX XXXX is connected to these accounts and they need to verify my identity by ensuring my coworker receives the funds on their end, then they are able to wipe the suspicious charges off of my account and help me with my XXXX. They said it was a two-step, full-proof verification process. Additionally, she kept exclaiming that my money was safe as it was going to my friend/coworkers account, right next to me, and nothing would happen to it. Looking back, I understand that this all sounds very convoluted and scam-like, but, in the moment, all of my coworkers and my advisors believed it was legitimate. This is how sophisticated the fraud was. 

My coworker created a cashapp account named asdfghjkl just for me, under her number ( XXXX ) ; I was sitting right next to her guiding her through the process, no bank account was linked to it, it was solely for me to send my money to and keep within the account until the verification process was over. I sent the amount of {$2200.00} in increments of {$1100.00}, {$1100.00}, and {$23.00} to this cashapp account, which was again, made solely for me. The fraud customer service had remote server-ed into both of our phones at this point without our knowledge, then, within an instant my funds were no longer in the cashapp account. I began XXXX  and the customer service line told me to check my bank account ; here, I saw that the cashapp payments had been reversed and no money was taken out of my account. As per the XXXX article What are XXXX XXXX : Is XXXX XXXX to Download?, a woman named XXXX XXXX went through a very similar ordeal but for the amount of {$23.00} XXXX dollars. XXXX was unaware because she could see the extra money in her bank account but the fraudsters took control of XXXX computer through XXXX and secretly transferred funds to make it seem as if no money had been taken. So, the fraud scheme is impingent on the leveraging of this remote server app to manipulate the victim by compromising their bank accounts. Again, I reiterate that this app was used as a remote server to tap into my friend/coworker and Is payment profiles and bank accounts, to make it seem like all of my money was untouched. 

At this point, Id like to mention that, as per any police report, I was interrogated by a detective and sworn to tell the truth when filing a report on this matter. All of the officers and detectives filed it under grand larceny as the XXXX account was made solely for my purposes, otherwise, they too were not going to take this fraud claim seriously and waive it off as an authorized transaction. I was under oath to tell the truth and I explained this exact situation to them after XXXX hours of traveling to different stations and meeting with different officers, to which all of the detectives and officers were extremely sympathetic and filed the report so that my bank and XXXX could help me. Again, given the large amount of money and my unwillingness to send the money to the fraud line and no goods or property given in exchange, this is a typical case of grand larceny. I provided the police report number already, but in case it was mistakenly left out of consideration for my fraud claim : XXXX. 

After tapping into my bank account, the fraud customer service line called me from a different number : ( XXXX ) XXXX at XXXX pm, which lasted XXXX minutes. They then said they unexpectedly had a server shut down and theyd call back in an hour. Right after the call ended, I checked my bank account again and was terrified to see that the payments were charged to my account again ; so, there were XXXX initial payments, XXXX reversals, and XXXX payments made after I ended the call, without my knowledge. I began to frantically call everyone and everything I could think of : my mom ( who I called at XXXX pm ), the fraud customer service line ( to plead with them, to which they then began to scream at me and demand more money ) who I called at XXXX and XXXX XXXX, the bank ( called at XXXX XXXX ), the real XXXX support line ( called at XXXX XXXX ), etc. I reported this as fraud as soon as possible to Bank of America, the representatives were so helpful and calming during this time. I was pacing around my campus, hysterically crying and genuinely thought I would unfortunately die without this money. After filing it as fraud, I went to the police station and filed the report. I spent days not sleeping, eating, or drinking water, calling Bank of America repeatedly to talk to someone, wondering what would happen to me. I am sad to say I thought very dark things during this time- because the thought of an additional debt, XXXX which threatened my new job and the shelter security I had, was just all too much. I was so relieved when the bank issued my temporary credit and when the police sided with me and gave me a support number, as well as the detective providing his personal phone number in case anything went wrong. I could finally focus on my work and feel like I could move on from this situation, though very traumatized and never trusting of online services again. Id also like to mention that both my coworker and I contacted cashapp customer service to which they were of no help ; they only provided us with a small detail about the bank information of the fraud servicing line for which my funds were transferred to : Stride national bank. Id hate to burden my coworker more as they too have had to change all passwords and create new bank accounts due to the risk of our information being stolen by the fraud service. Ive done everything in my power to learn from this situation ; I am constantly in fear that my identity will be stolen as they saw all my passwords, part of my SSN, and my bank information. 

I frantically checked the BOA message center a lot the first month and a half after filing the claim ; I hadnt seen any updates, so I let it be. This past month, right before my last XXXX final exams of my first semester as a XXXX  student, I checked my bank account to see a negative balance, {$2200.00} was taken out of my account due to the claim being resolved. I, again, frantically called BOA fraud servicing line ( as I practically have it on speed dial now ), and again, the representative calmed me down and reopened the claim. I was not alerted at all about this. She advised me to provide phone records to show my phone was compromised ; I asked my service provider ( XXXX ) and did research online to find that service providers can only provide phone call records, and that the bank should be able to deal with the rest. So, I am providing my phone call records for reference as well. I have provided the timestamps of the phone calls to each of these entities throughout this letter to provide a timeline, and show that none of these transactions amounting to the {$2200.00} are legitimate nor were authorized by me. Additionally, Id like to point out that, in the BOA claims resolution letter, {$23.00} was accredited to me from this same fraud scheme. However, the overwhelming amount of {$2200.00} was not. I do not understand the discrepancy and feel as though I should be properly compensated and protected from fraud as a customer of yours for over 10 years. 

This past week, after XXXX weeks of waiting and providing this supplemental letter and phone records ( as well as the my police report already on file ), Bank of America still rejects my fraud claim as legitimate. I was not alerted until days after the claim was " resolved '' on their end. I am a student, I do not have the luxury to spend over 3 months fighting with the Bank, XXXX, etc. over {$2000.00}. I desperately need my money back, I received no goods or services in exchange, I do not understand how else to prove that this if fraud, and without this money, I do not know what I will do. I can not get a second job, I am already a full-time student and full-time researcher. I do not deserve this.