Are there enough people here who would like to see Wells Fargo do one decent thing this week?

[bondwooley]

Last edited Sat Mar 15, 2014, 09:55 AM - Edit history (1)

UPDATE:

Thanks to all of you who sent a tweet to Wells Fargo, the campaign caught the attention of management. Wells Fargo has contacted William, apologized and restored all of his accounts. The struggle for fair banking practices continues, but thank you all for making them face one horror story that they had to resolve.

TEN SECONDS OF YOUR TIME COULD HELP A LOT OF PEOPLE AND ALL YOU HAVE TO DO IS TWEET



It’s easy to just shake your head when you hear about the evil things that banks do, and Wells Fargo has certainly caused a lot of head shaking. Their customers have been misled all the way into foreclosure. Families have been separated because of the bank’s actions. The company has driven some people to suicide. Since 2012, Wells Fargo has paid out nearly $400 million in fines and settlements for their misconduct and ineptitude — about $500,000 a day.

But we’re not here to put the bank out of business. We’re mad as Hell that they’re putting a friend of ours out of business.

HERE’S HOW YOU CAN TAKE 10 SECONDS TO HELP

Just copy this into a Tweet and send it off: I demand that @WellsFargo restore the accounts of #williamhellow immediately (via @bondwooley)

Please tweet that line. And tweet this article to your friends and ask them to. Let’s find out together if it’s true that Tweeting a deaf corporation pricks up their ears.

NOW HERE’S WHY YOU MIGHT WANT TO HELP

Our friend, William, has been banking with Wells Fargo for 10 years. He had his personal and business accounts seized this week by Wells Fargo — retroactively — under the guise of “fraud protection.” And even if Wells Fargo made a mistake, they can’t undo the mistake because of the Patriot Act.

They have left him no access to any form of cash or any way to restore his accounts for at least two weeks.

This doesn’t just affect him. It means he and his employees won’t see a payroll until next month at best. It means that his office subtenants are working in a space that is in default in rent. It means that his business and personal vendors are receiving checks right about now that will bounce. It means his home rent check will bounce. It means he’ll have to pay late fees on his credit cards. His business and personal credit ratings will drop. It means that he and his employees will be living on whatever is in their wallet right now for weeks. All because Wells Fargo has taken his money away “and put it in a secret place for his own protection.”

HOW DID THIS HAPPEN?

This week, William received several emails from Wells Fargo alerting him to a security breach with his online banking account. These emails stated that the breach took place a week prior (mystery #1). The emails had misspellings (mystery #2). Based on these signs of a phishing scam, he called the number provided (which was a real Wells Fargo number), but refused to tell the representative any of his personal information until she could prove that he was really speaking with a Wells Fargo representative – and she would not do so. By refusing to give over the phone his personal details to someone could be a potential phisher, all of his accounts at Wells Fargo were closed. Assets are now in a “secret place” that only Wells Fargo knows about. Calls to the bank and visits to the branch have come back to the same excuse: this is all for his protection because the Wells Fargo fraud protection department noticed that an out-of-state IP address logged into his online account last week.

Now let’s show what we can do!

“Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world; indeed, it’s the only thing that ever has.”
~Margaret Mead

[bondwooley]

1. Don't keep it to yourself

if anyone here happens to know how to get through to a thinking person at Wells Fargo beyond a Twitter bomb.

Thanks.

[truedelphi]

2. I just used both Twitter accounts to hashtag the situation.

These banks are fraudsters.

All of them.

They all need to be shut down.

But how in blazes is that going to happen.

I use checking cashing services rather than banks.

Wells Fargo tried to have me arrested for forgery, when all I was doing was opening an account. They could have called the person who issued the check, but they stated their laws don't allow them to do this.

So the police were called and my husband and I were physically thrown out of the bank.

This was

1) forcible detainment and kidnapping

2) false arrest
3) public embarrassment and humiliation

But no attorney in Northern Calif. will go up against Wells Fargo. They are just too big. It has also been revealed that almost 90% of all judges in the USA have some tie to Wells Fargo. So even if you get an attorney, if the judge is involved with WF, what chance does a litigant have?

[bondwooley]

3. That is very disturbing.

I'm sorry you went through that unnecessary B.S. and that my friend is, too. I'm not surprised about the judges. Wells F had tens of millions invested in private prison companies at one point.

[truedelphi]

4. Also, while I was opening my account (that then never got

Opened due to their suspicions that I was a forger) I watched as one "account executive" after another was sweet talking very poor people into opening a "Checking with savings insurance protection account"

What this account does is that it transfers every month some $ 25 from checking into your savings account!

So the poorest of the poor are gong to have to keep in mind which date that $ 25 goes off into a different account.

it is one of the fraudulent ways that Wells Fargo can sidestep some of the few regulations that people like Elizabeth Warren got put in place. The policies this kind of bank account allows for means people will be over extending their checking,the moment they forget about that monthly transfer.

I had to insist that they not give me the "special, extra help" of that program.

Who knows? Maybe my soft spoken insistence they not open that "special" account gave them the right to target me, according to their protocols? (And believe me, I speak very softly when inside Corporate offices.)

I had a seizure as a result of what happened, right there inside the damn lobby of WF.

And the bank officials - as I lay seizing - then told my husband they would not call paramedics, but only the police.

My doctor could not believe the shape I was in when I arrived at his office. He had seen me 48 hours prior to this incident, and I had gone from being a healthy, happy and alert low blood pressured person to someone who was semi comatose and shaking.

My doctor also keeps me supplied with fresh updates on other people he notices that banks have done this to. One poor guy who was accused of forgery was thrown in jail for two days, and while there, he lost his job. And he hadn't forged anything! But all the bankers have to do is to state that your signature "looks something like" the signature on the check. And then they can have you thrown in jail.

[bondwooley]

5. My God!

It just get worse.

And in the case above, it's not just affecting some guy whose account might have been hacked. It's affecting hundreds of people who rely on him. One of their excuses is that "he hasn't come in often enough to review his services" -- which we all know means spending more money with them.

[bondwooley]

6. Thank you!

[truedelphi]

7. If they' re doing this to one WF account holder, you better believe they are

Doing it to others.

[bondwooley]

8. Which is why they're paying

$500,000 a day in fines.

I supposed in some way they figure that's profitable.

[fayhunter]

9. Credit Unions

They're not perfect but they're a hell of a lot more human.

And Wells Fargo is the worst of the worst. When they took over Wachovia I was outta there.

[Aerows]

10. I don't think the management and upper echelons

of Wells Fargo would know decency if it whacked them across the back of the thighs with a hairbrush.

A parade could be launched outside of their homes entitled "decency" and they would just read it as "decrepit", "deficit" or "Oh, I won't get paid as much."

Asking the heartless to have a heartfelt response is like asking a kernel of corn to be an entire harvest. It just doesn't work that way.

[bondwooley]

11. Update!

Thanks to all of you who sent a tweet to Wells Fargo, the campaign caught the attention of management. Wells Fargo has contacted William, apologized and restored all of his accounts. The struggle for fair banking practices continues, but thank you all for making them face one horror story that they had to resolve.