Consumer complaint received 2024-08-04 00:00:00
Product: Checking or savings account — Checking account
Issue: Managing an account — Problem accessing account
Company: BANK OF AMERICA, NATIONAL ASSOCIATION
State: FL

Complaint narrative:
On XX/XX/year>, I received an email from Bank of America with the following message : " Act now to prevent your account ( s ) from being closed. We've had a hard time reaching you and noticed you still haven't updated your profile information. Please take a few minutes today to review and update your profile information. Your relationship is important to us and we want to help you keep your accounts open. As your bank, we're required to make sure your customer information is accurate and complete. Update your information now. '' Upon receiving this email, I promptly clicked on the provided link and was directed to the Bank of America app, where I was prompted to verify my legal name, social security number, date of birth, citizenship, residency, address, source of income, and occupation. After completing these steps and selecting " Confirm, '' the app navigated to a second screen where I verified my contact information. The app then indicated my contact information had been successfully verified. I completed this process on XX/XX/year>, at XXXX XXXX. However, on XX/XX/year>, both my wife and I received emails stating that our XXXX numbers had been deleted from our joint account. My XXXX account alerted my debit card was no longer active. 
Subsequently, without any additional communication from Bank of America, I discovered that our accounts were frozen, and a credit card account was permanently closed ( possibly, I have no records available on BoA website to confirm this ). Due to the account freeze, I was unable to access my funds, which I needed to make payments on three credit cards and a mortgage. This resulted in returned payments from all three credit cards and late fees.

XXXX XXXX one of my credit card issuers, has now banned me from using the frozen checking account to make payments, causing further complications. I contacted Bank of America on XX/XX/year>, at XXXX XXXX, for a duration of XXXX minutes at XXXX ( XXXX ) XXXX ( XXXX ). During this call, I confirmed the same information I had previously updated via the app, and my checking account was subsequently unfrozen. 

However, the bank claimed that they had made multiple attempts to contact me, though I have records of only two emails, one letter received on XX/XX/year>, and no voicemails. Again, that I complied with. When questioned about their policy on freezing accounts, the bank admitted that this policy is not publicly available to consumers, making it unreasonable for me to anticipate such severe consequences. The app 's interface is also misleading, as it indicates compliance with the bank 's requests when, in reality, it does not. 

This incident has caused significant financial disruption and late fees. I was forced to update my payment information on 17 different sites, including both mine and my wifes direct deposit information. I believe Bank of America 's actions and lack of transparent communication have been unreasonable and unjust.

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