Consumer complaint received 2023-01-24
Product: Checking or savings account — Checking account
Issue: Managing an account — Problem using a debit or ATM card
Company: CITIBANK, N.A. (NY)

On XXXX XXXX, 2022, I was the victim of a scammer who texted and then called me, posing as the Citibank fraud dept. alerting me to suspicious activity involving my accounts- specifically two debit purchases and a large transfer of funds from one linked checking account to the other. 

The caller provided a Citi employee badge ID number upon request, said they'd locked my account to prevent any further activity, and then talked me through two transfers via Citi 's XXXX payment app- supposedly restoring the transferred funds to their proper account - totaling {$4900.00}. When I asked for some additional information and a confirmation number for the call, the caller abruptly hung up. I called the number back, only to hear static. I then called Citi directly, and was told that while the transfers- both the fraudulent one the caller had mentioned, as well as the two XXXX transfers he had instructed me to make - had gone through, there was no record of the Citi fraud department contacting me, or of anyone with the name and badge ID the caller had given me working there. 

Upon determining that my accounts had somehow been accessed by the scammers and unbeknownst to me upgraded from Basic Banking to 'Priority ' status- thereby making more of my funds available to them - I immediately filed a claim for the lost funds with Citi XXXX In a few days, I got a form letter denying my claim on the grounds that the fraudulently-initiated XXXX transfers were 'consistent with my normal banking activities. ' On XXXX XXXX, I went to a Citi branch near my home, and met with a banker to escalate the claim and hopefully get a reasonable resolution. She contacted someone in the fraud department, and I re-explained the situation to him. In addition to re-submitting my claim, we also had to completely re-establish my Citi profile, opening brand new checking and savings accounts, new user ID, etc. 

On XX/XX/XXXX, I received a second form letter from Citi identical to the first one I got, citing the same reason for rejecting my re-submitted claim, and offering no additional information. 

Again : those two XXXX transfers were the result of fraud, and absolutely *not* consistent with my normal banking activities. I rarely use the XXXX app, and certainly never for amounts as large as the two transfers the scammers tricked me into making. 

Even more alarming, the Citi fraud department appears to have ignored the fact that prior to the scammer contacting me and impersonating a Citi employee, they were able to access my Citi profile and upgrade it to a Priority account, without my knowledge, without my consent, and without Citi alerting me of suspicious activity until XX/XX/XXXX - via an email, long after the alert would have been of any help. 

Upon receiving the second rejection letter, I emailed the banker I'd met with, asking her thoughts on any next steps we might take. After waiting a week for a response, I emailed her a second time to follow up ; as of this writing, she still has not responded. 

In addition to the financial disaster this has been, my anger and frustration is based in Citi 's failure to protect my online profile or alert me in a timely fashion that my account had suddenly been upgraded- both of which made nearly all of my cash assets available to the scammers. That anger and frustration has been compounded by Citi 's dismissive, generic rejections of my claim, and now the banker 's non-response to my email.