Consumer complaint received 2026-05-31 00:00:00
Product: Checking or savings account — Other banking product or service
Issue: Managing an account — Banking errors
Company: JPMORGAN CHASE & CO.
State: NY

Complaint narrative:
Subject : Unauthorized wire transfers totaling {$100000.00} from Chase business account ; Chase 's authentication procedure misled me into approving a fraudulent action, and Chase then failed to detect cascading fraud red flags wildly inconsistent with my established account usage, and has denied my claims. On XX/XX/year>, {$100000.00} was stolen from my Chase business account ( XXXX XXXX, account ending in XXXX ; Chase subsequently reissued the account under a new number ending in XXXX following the fraud ) via XXXX unauthorized wire transfers executed in a matter of minutes. The fraud began with a misleading Chase verification code that I reasonably believed was a routine login confirmation but which Chase had actually issued to authorize the addition of a new wire recipient. I have never added more than XXXX wire recipient per quarter, so the addition of XXXX recipients in a matter of minutes should be extraordinarily alarming on its own. Equally troubling : how could Chase have allowed the addition of XXXX wire recipients based on a single verification cXXXXe that fraudsters had triggered only once? From there, an account takeover unfolded with multiple cascading red flags that were wildly inconsistent with my established, multi-year pattern of account usage and that any reasonable fraud-monitoring system should have detected and blocked. Chase has XXXX denied my claims despite my multiple calls to my bankers and personal meetings at XXXX different branches ( the branch at XXXX XXXX XXXX, XXXX XXXXk, NY XXXX and the XXXX XXXX XXXX at XXXX XXXX XXXXXXXX XXXX XXXX, NY XXXX ). I am requesting that Chase reopen the investigation, reverse the unauthorized wires, and make my account whole. My established account usage pattern directly relevant to what Chase 's monitoring should have caught My wire-transfer history with this Chase business account is extraordinarily consistent and easy to characterize. Year after year, month after month, I send XXXX to XXXX wires per month to the same recurring recipients my regular monthly payroll to my team. Statements documenting this pattern are attached. Other than occasional federal income tax payments, this recurring monthly payroll activity is essentially my entire wire-transfer activity on this account. What happened on XX/XX/year> is the polar opposite of that pattern in every dimension : Number of recipients : XXXX recurring recipients over years XXXX brand-new recipients added in minutes. Number of wires per day : historically XXXX wires per month XXXX wires in a single brief window. Familiarity of payees : the same trusted payroll recipients for years XXXX payees never previously seen on the account. Dollar volume : a single predictable monthly payroll amount {$100000.00} drained from the account in minutes. Any commercially reasonable fraud-monitoring system pattern-matches new activity against historical account behavior. The XX/XX/XXXX activity diverged from my established pattern on every measurable axis simultaneously. This should have triggered an automatic hold on the very first wire, let alone all XXXX. How the fraud started the misleading verification cXXXXe On XX/XX/year>, I was repeatedly unable to log in to my Chase business online banking. While trying to log in, I saw a message on my computer screen instructing me to check my phone for a Chase verification cXXXXe in order to confirm my identity on the computer. I checked my cellphone and saw what appeared to be a standard Chase verification text message. Believing it was the verification cXXXXe needed to complete my login, I entered/used the code. I have since reviewed the screenshot of that text message on my phone, and it shows that the cXXXXe was in fact a permission to add a new wire recipient not a login verification, as the on-screen prompt had led me to believe. I did not request to add any wire recipient. I had no intention of authorizing any wire activity. I was simply trying to log in to my own account. The fraudsters appear to have triggered the wire-recipient-add action on the back end at the same moment I was attempting to log in, so that when Chase sent the verification XXXX, I would reasonably mistake it for a login cXXXXe and provide or approve it. The text message itself did not clearly and prominently warn me that I was authorizing the addition of a new payee to whom money could then be sent, and the on-screen context was a login prompt, not a wire setup. It is also unclear how a single confirmation code could permit the addition of multiple wire recipients at all. This is a failure of Chase 's authentication procedure. A commercially reasonable XXXX system for a high-risk action like adding a wire recipient should ( XXXX ) make the action being authorized unmistakably clear in the verification message, ( XXXX ) not allow a verification cXXXXe to be triggered while the account holder is in the middle of a separate authentication flow such as login, and ( XXXX ) require step-up authentication for adding multiple new wire recipients in rapid succession particularly on an account whose entire historical pattern is XXXX to XXXX wires per month to the same recurring payroll recipients. Timeline of the fraudulent activity on XX/XX/year> Approximately XXXXXXXX XXXX : Upon checking my email, I discovered a series of Chase notifications showing the following activity had just occurred on my account, none of which was knowingly authorized by me : XXXX. XXXX new wire recipients were added to my account in rapid succession. I had never sent wires to any of these recipients before. The volume and speed of payee additions were drastically inconsistent with my entire account history of recurring monthly payroll payees. As described above, at least the first of these was approved via a verification cXXXXe Chase had sent in a context that misrepresented what was being authorized. XXXX. My daily wire transfer limit was raised. I did not request this change. A sudden limit increase immediately followed by maximum-value outbound wires is a textbook account-takeover signature that fraud monitoring systems are specifically designed to flag. XXXX. XXXX wire transfers were executed in a matter of minutes, each for approximately {$18000.00}, totaling {$100000.00}. The wires were of similar amounts and sent to the XXXX newly-added recipients. This activity diverged from my established account behavior on every dimension simultaneously : number of wires, number of recipients, familiarity of payees, and total dollar volume. Each of these events individually should have triggered fraud review. Occurring in sequence within minutes, on an account with a years-long pattern of XXXX to XXXX monthly wires to the same recurring payees, they constitute XXXX of the clearest possible patterns of account takeover fraud. Chase took no action to pause, hold, or verify any of the activity. My immediate response documented in real time XXXX AXXXX XXXX XXXX XXXX after receiving the fraud alerts via email ) : I called the Chase Help Line at 1XXXX the number Chase itself provided in its alert emails to report the unauthorized activity and request that the wires be stopped. I could not log in to the account myself due to the lockout. The call log from my cellphone is attached. I also called my Chase XXXX, XXXX XXXX, who returned my call at XXXXXXXX XXXX the same day. That call log is also attached. Within approximately XXXX XXXXs of seeing the alerts, I went in person to the nearest Chase branch at XXXX XXXX XXXX, XXXX XXXX NY XXXX ( located on my block ). My account was locked down by XXXX XXXX that same day corroborated by an independent timestamped record showing that my recurring automatic rent payment to XXXX was deactivated at XXXXXXXX XXXX as a downstream effect of the account being locked. This places Chase on real-time, in-person notice of the fraud within approximately XXXX XXXX of the fraudulent wires being initiated well within the window in which wires can typically be recalled or held by the sending bank. Despite my in-person report and the obvious fraud indicators, Chase made XXXX attempt to stop or reverse the wires. Chase only opened XXXX claims ( XXXX claim per fraudulent wire ) : XXXX XXXX XXXX XXXX XXXX XXXX Notably, my Chase banker subsequently provided a handwritten note instructing me to personally contact the receiving banks and the police to attempt to recover the funds effectively offloading recovery responsibility onto me rather than Chase initiating wire recall requests through standard bank-to-bank channels. The handwritten note is attached. Chase 's handling of the claims XX/XX/year> : Chase denied my initial claims. No substantive explanation was provided that addressed the misleading verification code or the multiple red flags Chase 's monitoring system failed to act on. XX/XX/year> : I went in person to the XXXX XXXX XXXX at XXXX XXXX XXXX for a further meeting with a Chase banker my fourth meeting on this matter and asked that the claims be escalated given the undeniable pattern of account takeover fraud. Text messages confirming this and subsequent meetings at XXXX different branches are attached. XX/XX/year> : The escalated claims were also denied. Again, Chase 's denial did not address ( XXXX ) the deceptive authentication context in which the first wire recipient was added, XXXX XXXX ) why a single verification cXXXXe was permitted to authorize the addition of XXXX wire recipients, ( XXXX ) why its fraud monitoring failed to detect any of the cascading red flags that followed despite the activity being wildly inconsistent with my established account usage, or ( XXXX ) why no action was taken when I reported the fraud in real time, both by phone at XXXX AM and in person at a branch within approximately XXXX XXXX of the wires being sent. The Chase denial letter is attached. Why Chase 's denial is improper XXXX independent red flags Under UCC Article XXXX and Chase 's own published security commitments, a bank is expected to maintain commercially reasonable security procedures and to act on indicators of fraud. Chase 's procedures failed on at least XXXX independent fronts on XX/XX/year>, each of which should on its own have caused the wires to be held : XXXX. Deceptive XXXX verification. A code authorizing the addition of a new wire recipient was triggered and presented in a context that a reasonable customer would understand as a login verification, with no clear, prominent disclosure that the code in fact authorized adding a new payee. XXXX. A single verification code used to add XXXX recipients. Chase apparently allowed the addition of XXXX brand-new wire recipients on the basis of a single verification code triggered only once. At a minimum, each new wire recipient should have required an individual verification cXXXXe. XXXX. Alarmingly out-of-pattern activity. My account had a years-long, easily characterized usage pattern of XXXX to XXXX monthly wires to the same recurring payroll recipients. The XX/XX/XXXX activity XXXX wires, XXXX brand-new recipients, {$100000.00} in minutes diverged from that pattern on every measurable dimension at once. A commercially reasonable monitoring system performs exactly this kind of pattern-deviation analysis and should have automatically held the first wire. XXXX. Cascading structural red flags within minutes. Account lockout preceding the activity, mass addition of brand-new wire recipients, an unrequested upward change to wire limits, and immediate outbound wires to those brand-new payees this is a textbook account-takeover signature, recognized industry-wide. XXXX. Ignored real-time reporting. Chase had real-time notice from me at XXXX XXXX ( XXXX XXXX after the alerts arrived ), again from my banker 's return call at XXXXXXXX XXXX, and again in person at a branch within roughly XXXXXXXX XXXX of the wires being sent well within the window for wire recall requests. No recall was attempted. Instead, my Chase banker advised me in a handwritten note to contact the receiving banks and the police myself. What I am requesting XXXX. Reopening and full review of the claims by Chase 's executive office, not the front-line claims team that has twice denied them. XXXX. Full reimbursement of the {$100000.00} in unauthorized wire transfers. XXXX. A written explanation of ( XXXX ) why Chase 's verification message did not clearly disclose that it authorized adding a new wire recipient rather than confirming a login, ( XXXX ) why a single verification code was permitted to authorize the addition of XXXX wire recipients, ( XXXX ) why Chase 's fraud monitoring did not detect or hold any of the XXXX wires given the contemporaneous red flags and the wild divergence from my years-long account usage pattern, and ( XXXX ) why no wire recall was attempted by Chase after XXXX reported the fraud at XXXXXXXX XXXX and in person at a branch within approximately XXXX minutes. XXXX. Documentation of the security procedures Chase contends were " commercially reasonable '' for my account on XX/XX/year>, including the text and format of the wire-recipient-add verification SMS. All supporting documentation including the screenshot of the misleading Chase verification SMS, Chase email notifications with timestamps, the wire limit change notification, the XXXX fraudulent wire confirmations with timestamps, account statements documenting my years-long pattern of monthly payroll wires, the Bilt rent-payment deactivation record showing my account was locked down by XXXXXXXX XXXX on XX/XX/XXXX, call logs from my cellphone for the Chase Help Line call at XXXX XXXX and the return call from XXXX XXXX at XXXX XXXX XXXX the Chase Claim Response Letter , the handwritten note from my Chase banker instructing me to contact the receiving banks and the police, and text messages from Chase confirming subsequent meetings XXXX XXXX different branches is provided in the attached PDF. Additional documentation is available upon request.

Company response to consumer: Closed with explanation