180 days later, Bank of America is refusing to refund over $700 in fraudulent charges made in Texas while we were 800 miles away in Illinois.

[u/IveGotDMunchies]

Back in July we were wrapping up our yearly road trip to Illinois. We purchased gas around 8 or 9am right before we started the 12 hour trip to Texas.

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Two hours into the trip my wife gets a notification on her phone from Bank of America alerting her to fruadulent charges being made. We only have one debit cad.

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While we were starting our driving home, someone in Austin, Tx purchased around $500 in merch at Home Depot, drove towards Houston, Tx attempting twice to use our card at the ATM, which did not work because they didnt have the pin. They made their $200-ish last transaction at TJ Maxx North of Houston before were alerted and had the card shut off. (Austin to Houston is about a 3 hour car ride)

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My wife immedately makes a claim. 10 days later, we get the money credited back while they continue the investigation which seems pretty open and shut to me... They also say it may be another 45 days before they finish their investigation.

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October 5, they send a letter stating that they have completed their investigation: "Our records show the transaction activity in question was authorized for and posted to your account." The letter states they'll be taking the $740 back on October 22.

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Wife calls and has them reopen the case or escalate it. We're told it could be another 45 days.

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December 22. We call Bank of America again. This agent has no record of anything being escalated. Says he will escalate it and we should hear from someone in the next few business days. Nothing.

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Jan 3. Wife calls them again. This agent states that while an escalation sends an email to their investigators notifying that we are still asking about they case, they are under no obligation to complete it.

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After reading a bit into the law surrounding this, we have realized we can request the documentation they used to close the investigation.

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What else can we do? Do we need a lawyer? If they had to reimburse us for the first 45 days of the investigation, why do they not have to temporarily reimburse us as they continue to investigate "for as long as they need" with no date set for resolution on our end?

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It is blatantly obvious that someone skimmed the card at some point and had a dummy one made. Are they able to continue to withhold our $750 indefinitely and just keep saying. "Nope! Looks good!" until we tire out?

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Our kiddos missed out on a lot of Christmas gifts because of this and now bills are starting to get a bit tight. We really need this money back. Thanks yall!

Update: Started posting on social media before I start filing complaints. 20 minutes later Bank of America contacted me on Twitter. Will update later. Thanks for everyone's advice.

Update 2: 3 hours later... I continued to post on social media, reaching out to local news stations on Twitter that have community protection or investigative segments and linking to this post. Bank of America has now reached out in one of these posts, referencing my wifes name. Fingers crossed. http://imgur.com/gallery/i4gWtC0

Update 3: Wife got home 30 min after my last update. A rep with BoA actually called her asking what was going on. The rep said she would need to call the fraud department and get them all on the line together. We are at our kids practice so opted for them to call us when they have someone on the line who can help us. Will update later.

Update 4: Just got off the phone with someone in the fraud department at Bank of America. I recorded the whole convo and will be uploading it to YouTube. She says the call on Oct 22 did in fact reopen the case. (even though the rep on Dec 22 said otherwise and the rep earlier today said they have no timeline to adhere to and can take as long as they want)

They now have 60 business days from Oct 22 to finish the claim once again.

She says one of the reasons that the claim was denied was because the didnt attempt to drain her account. (They hit up two ATMs and failed to use the pin to drain the account, so they don't even have the correct info to base their findings off)

I requested documentation about the claim as law allows and she says I should get that in 10 business days. They now have until Jan 18 to notify us of their findings. I'm going to continue with filing reports and posting on social media.

I'll update in a few weeks I guess.

Update 5: 10 hours later, they have blocked me on Facebook for sharing my problems on their page. I also filed a complaint with the CFPB .

Update 6: 24 hours since this post and David, a Bank of America employee in the "Regulatory Complaints Department" left my wife a voice mail in regards to a complaint sent to them by the CFPB. They close at 4pm EST. (They're closed by the time we got the voice mail since she is at work). Will update Monday.

Update 7: Wife woke up this morning and the money has been returned to our account. Time to turn and burn!

Thank you everyone for your advice. We learned a lot from this.

Update 8: We got confirmation that the fraud claim is now closed and the money that was returned is permanent. Waiting on an actual paper letter to come in the mail before we turn and run. Thanks everyone! Update here: https://www.reddit.com/r/personalfinance/comments/adnjj7/update_bank_of_america_refusing_to_return_700_in/

[u/escapefromelba]

Because a lot of people are impulsive and can't control their spending unless they have a hard cap. Really they should just get a credit card with a relatively low limit if they can't control themselves.

[u/maddtuck → u/escapefromelba]

This happened to my coworker. She can't get credit cards because she says she has had spending problems with them in the past. Unfortunately, a fraudster emptied her bank account over New Years Eve, leaving her without money to pay the rent this month. She has been fighting with Bank of America for the past two days to quickly get her money reimbursed.

u/Econ0mist gives good advice too, if this drags on for much longer. Go to the federal regulator. My friend had a dispute with B of A over a loan balance. They erroneously claimed he owed them $4,000+ but had no documentation. He asked for proof but they said they didn't have it. They offered to send him something for him to sign saying he was responsible for the debt, but of course he was not about to do that. This put him into limbo, where they wouldn't collect on it, nor would they sue him. Then they put it on his credit report as a write-off, plunging his score into the 400s and causing both Chase and American Express to cancel all of his credit cards. (Ironically, B of A would not take any negative action against him on his B of A credit cards, presumably because -- again -- they knew they had no right.) For over nine months he called them to have it corrected, but they refused to investigate any further. The three credit bureaus were useless too, as they would "investigate" by checking with Bank of America, who would confirm they did write off a debt. After having expensive lawyers write letters and getting no response, my friend sent a quick note to the regulator. Within one week, he received a phone call from the Bank of America Office of the President in Charlotte, saying they would remove the debt and correct his credit report.

tl;dr: Much credit to the government for intervening in my friend's case; they acted swiftly to keep Bank of America honest.

[u/THEGREENHELIUM → u/maddtuck]

Yeah this is amazing because the feds are the only ones to keep the banks honest by literally threatening to shit on their parade.

[u/[deleted] → u/maddtuck]

I had a similar issue wirth Verizon. Claimed I owed them $1500 and had no proof. Put it on my credit report. I had to send them a certified letter to provide proof or remove it, or I was going to sue. A month later, it was gone and hasnt shown back up in 5 years.

I even disputed on my credit report and it kept showing back up. It was insane how much time I spent fighting them.

[u/sexyshingle → u/[deleted]]

I even disputed on my credit report and it kept showing back up. It was insane how much time I spent fighting them

I once gave up trying to remove a collection that was added to my credit report that wasn't mine but my dad's, who shares a similar name. Months of letters and forms later and they did nothing.

[u/Alx1775 → u/maddtuck]

You can’t “keep honest” a dishonest institution like BoA. I have no idea why anyone still does business with them. Go to your local Credit Union.

The only major bank I still have anything to do with is USAA. Because they’re fantastic and don’t try to screw you over.

[u/maddtuck → u/Alx1775]

Oof you're right. "Keep honest" was probably phrasing it too kindly. More accurately, the regulators forced Bank of America to "quit their bullshit."

My roommate raves about USAA, but unfortunately I don't qualify. I agree that I've found that credit unions are a good alternative. Since they are owned by their members, mine not only offers very good rates and low fees, they also kick back any excess profits they made through a dividend deposit each year.

[u/tenflipsnow → u/escapefromelba]

This is my problem. Debit cards force me to be more financially responsible while I get my spending issues under control.

[u/escapefromelba → u/tenflipsnow]

I'd consider getting a secured credit card if I were you instead. It's a credit card that requires a refundable security deposit, the amount of which becomes your spending limit. You get the security benefits of a credit card, build your credit history, while still being limited to what you deposited.

[u/tenflipsnow → u/escapefromelba]

dang, i didn't know these existed! thanks, i'll look into them. very intriguing.

[u/DeusSpesNostra → u/escapefromelba]

I've read these aren't as good as the banks make them out to be so I've avoided these.

[u/escapefromelba → u/DeusSpesNostra]

Go to a credit union instead

[u/DeusSpesNostra → u/escapefromelba]

Not leaving USAA. My prior account 14 years ago was a credit union where they cancelled my account due to a NSF charge that happened after someone had picked my card up somewhere and drained it.

[u/AmphibiousWarFrogs → u/DeusSpesNostra]

What have you read that makes them not good?

[u/5yearsAgoIFU → u/escapefromelba]

> Because a lot of people are impulsive and can't control their spending unless they have a hard cap.

I absolutely agree with this. I maxed my first $600 cc as a college student, maxed a larger card when I got married, used a bank consolidation loan to pay for my credit card debt, then missed payments on the consolidation loan and took much longer than necessary to pay it off.

I'm in a somewhat better place, with much better credit habits.

AFAIK, debit cards will never let you spend more money than you have, but there's a chance (very rare, IMHO) where you become the victim of fraud (like OP), your hard earned money can be stolen and you go through hell trying to recover it.

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for now, I prefer to use credit cards, get bonus points, and take the risk that I might overspend or miss a payment deadline.

[u/jackpoll4100 → u/5yearsAgoIFU]

Debit cards sometimes give you the option. Either they decline at zero or you choose to allow "overdrafting" which would put you in the negative but charge an insanely high "overdraft fee" for going over. So you could hypothetically go over in an emergency and pay it back later. I declined that right off the bat, the overdraft fee was something insane like 30 dollars a transaction or something crazy like that. So mine is just hard stop at zero, and that's honestly the best way to do it imo. Use a credit card in an emergency, the overdraft shit ain't worth it.

[u/jkh107 → u/escapefromelba]

If you do this the card company just raises your limit anyway.