Common complaints against Wells Fargo include the unauthorized opening of customer accounts, improper mortgage and auto loan servicing, and unjustified, excessive, or hidden fees. Customers frequently report issues with unexpected overdraft fees, frozen accounts, poor customer service, and wrongful repossession or foreclosure actions.
Wells Fargo has been in the spotlight for the last several years for huge scandals involving fake bank accounts, white collar crime, fraud cases such as mine, and botched loans. They have had massive issues with their corporate culture and have a revolving door of CEO's.
While Bank of America often leads in total complaint volume to the CFPB, Wells Fargo frequently ranks high for its poor reputation and scandals (like fake accounts) alongside JPMorgan Chase, but some analyses show smaller banks like Capital One, Discover, or TCF National Bank (now part of Huntington) having higher complaint rates relative to deposits, indicating worse customer experience per dollar held.
More than 16 million accounts at Wells Fargo were subject to their illegal practices, including misapplied payments, wrongful foreclosures, and incorrect fees and interest charges.
In 2016, a scandal involving Wells Fargo creating fake accounts—which may have harmed more than 2 million consumers—increased scrutiny of the bank by Congress, financial regulators, and the public.
What led to the sale? It's pretty clear that Buffett and Berkshire exited Wells Fargo because of the years of dealing with the fallout of the bank's phony accounts scandal, in which employees at Wells Fargo opened credit card and bank accounts on behalf of thousands of customers without their consent.
Wells Fargo faces ongoing investigations and legal scrutiny, primarily for issues stemming from its past sales practices (fake accounts, misapplied loans) and more recently for alleged "sham" diversity hiring practices, anti-money laundering/sanctions program weaknesses, and improper handling of customer cash sweep programs, leading to massive fines and settlements, though the diversity hiring probes recently closed.
The 7 Worst Banks in America:
10 Most Common Customer Complaints and How to Solve Them
In September 2016, Wells Fargo, America's largest retail bank, announced it had fired 5,300 employees for fraudulently opening more than 2.5 million accounts. Wells Fargo will pay US$185 million in fines to regulators and $5 million will be returned to customers who paid fees on accounts they did not ask to have.
From 2002 to 2016, gaming practices included forging customer signatures to open accounts without authorization, creating PINs to activate unauthorized debit cards, moving money from millions of customer accounts to unauthorized accounts in a practice known internally as “simulated funding,” opening credit cards and ...
Wells Fargo will pay $3.7 billion to settle charges that it illegally mistreated its customers. The nation's top consumer protection regulator says the actions caused some customers to lose their cars or even their homes.
U.S. Bank and Wells Fargo shuttered the most branches this past year, combining to close a net total of 180 branches. This accounts for more than half of the net bank closures this year, according to OCC data.
Status: In progress. The Wells Fargo settlement benefits consumers who were enrolled in recurring billing by any of the Tarr, Triangle or Apex entities since 2009. A list of the entities can be found on the settlement website.