Consumer complaint received 2024-12-18 00:00:00
Product: Checking or savings account — Savings account
Issue: Managing an account — Deposits and withdrawals
Company: SANTANDER HOLDINGS USA, INC.
State: CA

Complaint narrative:
XXXX XXXX XXXX XXXX Account Complaint Unable to withdraw the funds from this account.

XX/XX/XXXX : attempted to transfer funds from Santander bank to its originating bank, but was told there was an error. 
XX/XX/XXXX : called the Santander bank and spoke to a customer representative, named XXXX, and I explained to him regarding the request for transfer of funds to my originating bank, XXXX XXXX. He informed me that there is a limit on daily transfer out and that I could transfer out only {$100000.00} and not {$250000.00} that I had previously requested. I asked him to request the manager to make an exemption, since I needed these funds to pay US government treasury and I had deadline. 
He spoke to his manager and returned back and stated they can not transfer XXXX but I could initiate XXXX dollar transfer and then do another similar transfer next day. 

So, XX/XX/XXXX : I initiated {$100000.00} transfer from Santander to XXXX XXXX, which is a linked bank account with Santander I got a message that it was being processed. 
XX/XX/XXXX : I made second request for transfer of {$100000.00} from Santander, to XXXX XXXX XXXX. 
When I checked the bank account to get the update on the transfer, I saw that it was being processed. But it did not say that the transfer had been initiated. 
So I called the bank this morning and spent over half an hour discussing the issue with the bank customer representative. Her name sounded like XXXX, XXXX not sure of the spellings. 
She told me that there was a bank hold on the transfer for both the transfer requests. She stated that this was done for my safety to make sure that it was the one requesting the transfer. 
I explained to her that when I called yesterday and when I called today, XXXX representatives did not ask me any security questions. She, and yesterdays representative, recognized me just from my phone numberc. From my phone number. And they both provided me with all the bank information without any security questions being asked of me. 
And furthermore, the transfer request is going back to the original bank XXXX XXXX XXXX, from where the funds said originated. So I didnt understand why they should be a security hold on the transfer out. 
I requested her to talk to her supervisor and have the whole be released so they could process the transfer immediately.

After being on hold for about 10 minutes, she returned back and she stated they could not remove the hold and the hold will be most likely released tomorrow afternoon and that means they will not even start initiating the process of transfer up until the hold was released. 
I asked to talk to her supervisor so that the funds could be released. I also asked her if there was any other additional information that I could provide for them to be able to release the hold immediately. She told me that they have all the necessary information and there was none needed from me.

I then asked her to file a complaint with the bank regarding this issue. 
I was again on hold for another 10 minutes and she reported that she did file Complaint with her bank. And that she has requested the manager to call me back.

I did inform her that the matter was urgent since I needed to pay the US government treasury and would incur penalties and interest if my payment is not made in time. 
I had requested to do a wire transfer in order to expedite the transfer, but I was informed by them that they do not do outgoing Wire transfer from the bank. 
I informed her that I would be filing a report with CFPB.

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