![]() Additionally, this article will provide information on what to do if no response is received from Wells Fargo and options for taking legal action. This article will explore the steps to dispute a charge with Wells Fargo, including researching your consumer rights, gathering evidence, contacting the credit card company, and understanding the statute of limitations. If you’ve encountered an issue with a charge from Wells Fargo, it is important to understand your rights as a consumer. “It’s out and out illegal - there’s no dispute that opening up a credit card in someone’s name is not allowed under the truth in lending act.” (Under the settlement, Wells Fargo did not admit to wrongdoing.Consumer Rights, Credit Report, Dispute Charge, Statute Of Limitations, Wells Fargo Introduction “The extent of, basically, the fraud going on that was kind of surprising,” she said. Still, the scale of the operations exposed by this week’s settlement were striking, Wu said. “They were the ones that were most aggressive about reordering transactions from high to low to maximize overdraft fees,” she said. This isn’t the first time Wells Fargo has boosted its fee revenue at customers’ expense, said Chi Chi Wu, staff attorney at the National Consumer Law Center. Wu said customers should hang onto any letters they get from the bank pertaining to remediation in case they need to prove their case and dispute negative credit activity that was triggered by a falsely opened account. ![]() Two specialty bureaus called ChexSystems and Early Warning both keep tabs on negative bank activity, so if a Wells Fargo customer had an account opened in their name unknowingly, and that account incurred fees before it was closed, these bureaus would keep a record of that kind of behavior. There currently is no set timeline for completing that, but banking experts say it could take a while, given the scope of the scandal. Part of the settlement terms with the CFPB stipulated that Wells Fargo hire a third-party consultant to comb through the bank’s books back to 2011, and identify and contact customers who might not be aware that accounts were opened in their names. In an FAQ about the settlement, the bank urges customers to use online banking to monitor their accounts, although calling the number on their statement or visiting a branch also is an option for worried customers. In a statement, Wells Fargo said it had refunded $2.6 million so far “for any fees associated with products customers received that they may not have requested.” “There were so many people being disciplined… Did the bank respond soon enough, quickly enough, aggressively enough?” “If 5,300 people were terminated on this over five years… they’re firing about one percent of their branch workforce every year,” Ely said. The size of the scandal prompts questions. Service charges on deposit accounts at the nation’s biggest financial institutions comprise about 15 cents out of every dollar in income, Moebs said. ![]() "It comes down to expenses - financial institutions can’t produce enough from their loan and investment activity to cover their expenses,” said CEO and economist Michael Moebs. Read More: Study Shows Huge Spike in Complaints from Banking Customers After financial reform laws and low interest rates cut into other revenue streams, banks came to rely more on fee revenue, especially for transactions like overdrafts, on which they collectively earn approximately $32 billion a year, according to financial data and research firm Moebs Services. Wells Fargo has long prided itself on its ability to cross-sell products to existing customers, a tactic that became more important after the financial crisis. “This is an instance of thousands of people believing that this behavior was expected and would be rewarded, and that message came from somewhere.” “If 5,000 people were engaged in it, how many do you think knew? This is not an instance of improper oversight,” said Julie Ragatz, director of the Center for Ethics in Financial Services at the American College of Financial Services.
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