Consumer complaint received 2025-01-10 00:00:00
Product: Credit card — General-purpose credit card or charge card
Issue: Other features, terms, or problems — Problem with rewards from credit card
Company: BANK OF AMERICA, NATIONAL ASSOCIATION
State: DC

Complaint narrative:
I called Bank of America on XXXXXXXX  and on XX/XX/XXXXXXXX  regarding the bank 's failure to credit the airline incidental credit in compliance with the terms and conditions of the Bank of American XXXX XXXX XXXX. 

The Terms and Conditions provide in relevant part : " To qualify, you must use your XXXX XXXX XXXX credit card to pay all airline incidental fee transactions. Allow 2-3 weeks from qualifying for the statement credit to post to your account. [ ... ] Qualifying transactions are those purchases made on domestic-originated flights on certain U.S.-domestic airline carriers that include : preferred seating upgrades, ticket change/cancellation fees, checked baggage fees, in-flight entertainment, onboard food and beverage charges, and airport lounge fees affiliated with eligible airline carriers [ ... ] Eligible travel expenses that qualify for the Airline Incidental Credit must appear under one of the following XXXX XXXX XXXX XXXX XXXX XXXX XXXX XXXX XXXX XXXX XXXX XXXX XXXX XXXX ( See XXXX XXXX XXXX XXXX XXXX XXXX XXXX XXXX XXXX XXXX I had made additional purchases that have not been credited for my XXXX airline incidental credits. These purchases include : XXXX XXXX purchases of {$35.00} ( XX/XX/XXXX ), {$35.00} ( XX/XX/XXXX ), {$35.00} ( XX/XX/XXXX ), {$35.00} ( XX/XX/XXXX ). Combined, these {$140.00} in purchases would exhaust the rest of my {$300.00} annual credit. 

On XX/XX/XXXX, Bank of America staff confirmed that all of these purchases were in a qualifying XXXX and purported to submit the qualifying purchases for review, quoting a 14 day turn around for a decision. In addition, all of these purchases were in the qualifying categories listed in the terms and conditions, as they were bag fees. 

On XXXX, Bank of America mailed a physical letter with Case number XXXX, signed by XXXX XXXX XXXX. On XXXX, I called the number listed on the letter and the Bank of America representative was unable to identify any such case or any information related to the missing credit. 

Consistent with the CFPB 's examination manual, I asked if the Bank had a policy to escalate complaints where the bank has violated the law. In this case, the bank is engaged in Unfair, Deceptive, and Abusive Acts or Practices ( UDAAPs ) in violation of 12 USC 5331 et seq., as well as the commission of fraud. The representative indicated the Bank has no such policy and that he would hang up on me if I continued to reference the bank violating the law. 

Here is the relevant portion of the CFPB examination manual : " Consumer complaints that raise legal issues involving potential consumer harm from unfair treatment or discrimination, unauthorized product enrollment, account openings or upgrades ( including the addition of ancillary products ), improper sales practices, imminent foreclosures, or other regulatory compliance issues, are appropriately categorized and escalated. '' Note that Bank of America similarly failed provide these credits last year until I filed at CFPB complaint. When I filed that complaint, Bank of America staff manually credited the missing statement credits, the manual nature of which appears on the consumer-facing side, and then knowingly provided false information in the response that the credits had always been correctly applied the entire time. In doing so, the Bank violated 18 U.S.C. 1005 and 1006 because the purpose of that false information was to mislead the CFPB, who is included in responses to CFPB complaints.

Out of an attempt to be helpful, I would encourage the bank to investigate whether the root cause of the failure for the bank to appropriately credit the credits this year is because the data structure for the number of qualifying purchases is too small. In other words, the system may have stopped crediting qualifying purchases to my account for the year because the number of prior credits exceeded its limit rather than because the dollar threshold had been met or because the system failed to correctly identify the qualifying purchases. 

This is more likely if the XXXX XXXX airline incidental credit was built over the prior XXXX airline incidental credit, which is limited to {$100.00} in airline incident reimbursement instead of the {$300.00} provided for the XXXX XXXX.

Company public response: Company has responded to the consumer and the CFPB and chooses not to provide a public response
Company response to consumer: Closed with explanation