Consumer complaint received 2024-12-03 00:00:00
Product: Vehicle loan or lease — Loan
Issue: Managing the loan or lease — Billing problem
Company: Westlake Services, LLC
State: AR

Complaint narrative:
My phone is XXXX. On XX/XX/year> I contacted Westlake financial by phone to make a payment on my auto loan. The payment was late. Total amount due was XXXX $ which included all late fees. Through their recorded line I gave the call center rep my debit card ending in XXXX. The rep ended our call with " ok thank you, you will receive the confirmation email ''. Since dealing with Westlake financial for several years I have become familiar with a few of their practices. The CC REP never says thank you unless the payment has gone thru. The CC REP doesn't initiate an email so confirmation to or a declined transaction. One week later on XX/XX/year> Westlake financial calls me to inform me that the transaction of XX/XX/year> did not go thru successfully. Whereas I am on SSXXXXI I did not have the means to submit payment on XX/XX/year>. I needed to check my bank statement first in order to see what actually happened on XX/XX/year> with my {$350.00} debit transaction to Westlake financial. I bank with XXXX. XXXX has a habit of rearranging the order of my transactions. I did see the Westlake financial transaction for {$350.00}. And it was declined for insufficient funds. However, I am not sure that on XX/XX/year> XXXX actually declined the transaction. About one week after my XX/XX/year> phone call with Westlake financial I received notice in the mail that the late payment amount of {$350.00} had increased to {$510.00}. {$100.00} penalty for insufficient funds. Westlake financial has never charged that amount before and I did not receive notice of updated fees. Additionally they added on a fee and called it " remaining repossession amount ''. Well Westlake financial will not release a vehicle unless all fees are paid in full. XX/XX/year> my vehicle was repossessed. The notice sent to me stated I had to pay {$860.00} to have my car released. However, Westlake financial, at some point, cancelled or deleted my ACH. As a result my ACH payments to them stopped. This created arrears which led to repossession. I was not made aware of any changes to my ACH withdrawals. Westlake financial blamed me for the auto pay issue and XXXX verbally demanded that I pay {$2000.00} to get my car back. Borrowing from friends and family allowed me to make a payment every day or 2 on t the {$2000.00} before Auction day. After completion of {$2000.00} payment I called Westlake to ask where my car was. Westlake will not share repo location before payment is made. Westlake had my vehicle towed to Missouri to the place of auction even though I contacted them every 24 to 48 hours with viable payment increments. To make matters worse Westlake had the responsibility of sending the auction house a Release. The release allows me to retrieve my vehicle. It took 3 or 4 days for Westlake to send the auction house the release. Next step find a vehicle to make the trip to Missouri to retrieve my car. A family member and my son made the trip, got my vehicle and drove back to XXXX XXXX AR. Back to the {$510.00} allegedly owed. On XX/XX/year> Westlake was successfully paid thru auto pay {$240.00}. Thereafter the incessant phone calls began again. They call from XXXX XXXX AR local exchanges. They call from exchanges of calls made by me to people I know. Most recently they used a XXXX exchange from XXXXXXXX XXXX. My deceased grandmother resided there. Westlake is a disgrace. Recently I answered their call and explained that the inflated arrears of XX/XX/year> I would dispute. All payments XXXX, XXXX, XXXX were processed accordingly. The CC REP said that XXXX and XX/XX/year> payments were each for the previous month. Ok. If that were accurate my bank statement does not reflect such information. What happened to the {$510.00} I allegedly owe for XX/XX/year> and which I received notice of via USPS? XX/XX/year> is my next ACH for {$240.00} .Living with XXXX and being harassed by phone, intimidated by relocating my vehicle and demanding more than twice the amount stated on notice, using exchanges other than a California or XXXX exchange is all too much.

Company response to consumer: Closed with explanation