Consumer complaint received 2020-03-08
Product: Vehicle loan or lease — Lease
Issue: Problems at the end of the loan or lease — Problem when attempting to purchase vehicle at the end of the lease
Company: ALLY FINANCIAL INC. (VA)

Our vehicle lease with Ally Financial was set to expire XX/XX/XXXX. Given the excellent condition of the leased vehicle and its very low mileage, approximately a month prior to the lease end date, we began exploring options beyond just simply turning the vehicle into Ally at the end of its lease. As we learned from prior leased vehicles, our diligent care of the vehicle offered a very good chance that a dealership purchasing that vehicle from Ally would result in additional funds toward a new lease. This was the case for our previous leased vehicles. To this end, in late XX/XX/XXXX, we attempted to login to our Ally account to obtain the payoff amount for our vehicle the amount a dealership would need to send Ally to purchase the car and leave our account free and clear of all obligations. However, when we attempted to login, we learned that access to our account including our monthly statements and our payoff amount was terminated after XX/XX/XXXX, almost one full month before our lease end date of XX/XX/XXXX. This was alarming since we had previously enrolled in paperless statements at Allys encouragement ( this was our first lease with Ally - had we known the online account access would be prematurely cut-off, we would have made different arrangements to preserve our account information ). Because access to our statements and other account information was abruptly terminated before the end of our lease, the only way to obtain a payoff quote was to contact Ally by phone. 

On XX/XX/XXXX, we called Ally while at XXXX XXXX XXXX in XXXX, Virginia ( this dealership had a new XXXX  that we were interested in leasing ). Upon calling Ally, we were told we no longer had access to the account because the lease was ending soon. When we explained the nature of our need to access the account ( to determine how much was needed to buy us free and clear from the current lease ), Ally refused to speak with us, the account holders, and stated they would only have that discussion with a dealership representative. While we found this quite odd, Ally made it clear they would not provide this information in any other way ; as such, we were left with no choice but to trust the dealership representative. This representative, XXXX XXXX, obtained from Ally the payoff amount of {$32000.00}, which he then wrote on the back of his business card. While speaking with Ally, Mr. XXXX confirmed that this amount was inclusive of all taxes and fees that accrued on the vehicle during the lease term, and would leave us free and clear of the existing vehicle and financial obligations to Ally. 

With a new lease quote from XXXX XXXX XXXX in hand, we located a second vehicle we were interested in closer to our home at XXXX XXXX XXXX XXXX XXXX in XXXX, Virginia. After some back and forth, XXXX XXXX agreed to cover what Ally informed us ( via the previous dealerships representative ) was the full amount we owed to Ally - {$32000.00}. On XX/XX/XXXX, we signed a lease for a new vehicle with XXXX XXXX. As a part of this new lease agreement, XXXX XXXX agreed to purchase our existing vehicle by sending Ally a check for {$32000.00} ( the salesman at XXXX XXXX rounded the payoff amount up to cover any miscellaneous processing fees, etc. that occasionally come up ). We were repeatedly assured by the sales team that the check to purchase the vehicle free and clear would be sent to Ally directly. We left our old vehicle with XXXX XXXX and left with our new leased vehicle, and based on the payoff amount provided by Ally on XX/XX/XXXX with the understanding that our lease with Ally would be completely paid off once it received the {$32000.00} check from XXXX  XXXX  ( or if anything, we may be owed a small refund ). 

However, we subsequently received a letter dated XX/XX/XXXX from Ally indicating that the vehicle had been returned to Ally Financial. This letter asked us to confirm the odometer reading of the vehicle at the time it was turned in ( a totally moot and unnecessary request if XXXX XXXX had purchased the vehicle ). Shortly thereafter, we received another letter from Ally dated XX/XX/XXXX, confirming the end of our lease, but alleging that we still owed Ally a balance of {$3300.00}. Per the included Account Settlement from Ally, the majority of the alleged outstanding amount was for Personal Property Tax. As XXXX  XXXX  had agreed to send Ally a check covering the payoff for the entire amount owed on the vehicle including property taxes we called Ally to clarify the discrepancy and were told by XXXX at Ally that according to Allys records the vehicle had not been paid off, but instead had been turned into Ally and subsequently re-sold. XXXX even provided us with the resale amount of {$32000.00}. In an effort to gather as much information as possible before proceeding, when we then asked for copies of our most recent statements which, as noted above, we were unable to access during the end of our lease. We were told that, because our lease had ended, our account was in collections and we would need to speak with the collections department for this information. Upon being transferred to the collections department, the collections representative denied having access to that information, and would only repeatedly ask when we were going to pay the alleged amount due. 

Still attempting to resolve this troubling discrepancy with Ally, on XX/XX/XXXX, we again contacted Ally, who again refused to provide us with any prior statements or other account information to support the amount they were now demanding we pay. The only additional information Ally did provide was from XXXX in Allys Personal Property Tax Division, who provided 3 separate statements for the personal property tax that had accrued for the years XXXX, XXXX, and XXXX. The three statements totaled {$3100.00}, an amount inconsistent with the figure provided on the XX/XX/XXXX statement from Ally, which indicated an outstanding property tax amount of {$3200.00}. 

As Ally refused to provide even basic information to substantiate the additional amount they were demanding we pay, before proceeding further with Ally, we attempted to work with XXXX XXXX to confirm the final disposition of the vehicle in question. Unfortunately, the sales and finance department at XXXX XXXX did not respond to our repeated attempts to contact them for several months. On XX/XX/XXXX, to finally obtain answers from XXXX XXXX, we filed a formal complaint against the dealership with the XXXX County Department of Consumer Services. After being contacted by the XXXX County Department of Consumer Services, on XX/XX/XXXX, XXXX XXXX XXXX provided a copy of a check for {$32000.00} that it sent to Ally on XX/XX/XXXX. It was at this time we realized that, although woefully unresponsive to our inquires, XXXX XXXX did indeed send Ally a check to pay off Ally in full. 

On XX/XX/XXXX, we were told via the car salesman that Ally insisted on speaking with that the payoff amount for our lease with Ally, inclusive of all taxes, was {$32000.00}. On XX/XX/XXXX, XXXX XXXX XXXX sent a check to Ally in the amount of {$32000.00} which would cover this entire amount. Nevertheless, Ally is now insisting that we still owe thousands of dollars, without so much as providing us any insight into where that amount is coming from. Further, what little information we could obtain from Ally is either inaccurate or flat out wrong. As noted above, Ally provided us with an amount of {$3100.00} in property taxes accrued during the lease. However, Allys letter dated XX/XX/XXXX, indicates an accrued property tax amount of {$3200.00}. Further, and even more befuddling, Ally indicated in XX/XX/XXXX that the vehicle had been turned back into Ally. This is blatantly incorrect as XXXX XXXX XXXX sent Ally a check for {$32000.00} and kept the vehicle. 

This ordeal with Ally began when Ally denied us access to an account for a vehicle that we were still legally and financially responsible for. Ally then refused to speak with us when we called to ask what the payoff amount for the vehicle would be. Ally would only provide that payoff amount which Ally stated was inclusive of all accrued taxes and fees to a third-party. Ally was sent a check to cover that payoff amount in full. Nevertheless, Ally is now demanding that we pay an additional {$3300.00} while providing virtually no information to substantiate this claim. Equally troubling is that even a brief internet search on Ally Financial reveals that our situation is not unique numerous individuals have filed similar complaints against Ally, which suggests this is a well-established pattern of deceptive business practices, if not completely fraudulent behavior.