Customers report missing deposits from Wells Fargo bank accounts | Hacker News Reader

Customers report missing deposits from Wells Fargo bank accounts

cnn.com

68 pointsrntn64 comments

I remember hearing about certain sales incentives Wells Fargo had which encouraged many bankers to open up accounts on the behalf of strangers they'd never spoken to -- I understand this is commonly called "fraud" -- which had very real effects on some of said strangers' credit reports. It is a consequence borne of a lack of regulation enforcement.

I found reports as recent as today when doing a search for this: https://www.nbcnews.com/news/investigations/phony-bank-accou....

Well, that was a big news story for .. years? It is pretty widely known about.

And yet, Wells Fargo is still in business and still has customers. And they kept their name. Amazing. Utterly Amazing. Economics, where art thou?

They were commiting massive fraud on a massive scale, and no one went to jail. Just a 3 billion fine, which they probably just borrowed at negative interest rate from the Fed.

> It is pretty widely known about.

I'm one of those who lives under a rock. There's commonly something that "everybody knows" -- as some will claim -- which I'm just learning about. That said, it is actually news to me that this was occurring as recently as June 2022. The initial stories broke in 2016.

You are one of today's lucky 10 000 !

https://xkcd.com/1053/

This is in part why I chose to share the story. There might be dozens of people I can reach with my comment!

Yep. I'm truly amazed that anyone continues to bank with them. They're straight-up crooks.

Wells Fargo is one of the worst banks in the world: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wells_Fargo#Lawsuits,_fines,_a...

Are they one of the worst or just one of the largest? JPMorgan Chase[0], Bank of America[1], and Citigroup[2] are the only US banks that are larger, and they've had their fair share of problems. It seems like large scale banking in general has major issues, and Wells Fargo just gets a lot of attention because they're one of the largest.

(Note that this isn't a defense of Wells Fargo: I recently shut down my account with them in large part due to these repeated problems.)

[0] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/JPMorgan_Chase#Lawsuits_and_...

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bank_of_America#Lawsuits,_cont...

[2] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Citigroup#Criticism

I think BoA took too long to digest a spree of acquisitions. I use them for a business and have had a good experience.

Chase I’m not sure. I heard that they can be better or worse depending on what state your account is based in.

I’ve never heard a good word about Wells Fargo, ever.

I’m always surprised at how money folks use big commercial banks. I’ve never had an instance where my local credit union isn’t a better option.

> I’ve never had an instance where my local credit union isn’t a better option.

In general, absolutely.

I did have to open an account with a big bank a number of years ago in order to handle frequent international money transfers. I'm no longer in that situation, though.

> Are they one of the worst or just one of the largest?

Perhaps those groups are identical.

I guess that's what I'm suggesting, yeah. But I suspect it is because of the amount of money involved and not that other banks wouldn't be as bad if they could.

i personally suspect a bit of survival bias is in play. A small "grab the money and run" scam bank would be even worse but by definition doesn't survive.

I received $150 in a class action settlement from WF. How they still have a damn banking charter is beyond me. It's modern day highway robbery.

How they still have customers is also beyond me. They're awful to deal with.

You can’t control who buys your mortgage from whatever bank you originally got a mortgage with. Even if you refinance to another bank, they can just resell it again. I assume this is true of other kinds of debt. Not all their customers are people who don’t know any better.

Also, I think people probably have some systemic trust that really bad actors will be eventually removed, but unfortunately that seems not to ever happen to Wells Fargo despite what is at this point hundreds of years of bad behavior.

They have a huge number of branches all over the US. That is the only reason a relative of mine uses them, because he travels frequently and needs cash fast often. The 3-4 times I've went into WF helping him deal with stuff has been an absolute clown show every time.

My bank is in Texas. I live in Massachusetts. I think in over 30 years, that’s been a mild inconvenience exactly once and otherwise “no difference detected”. (The once was an overnight delay to get a cashier’s check for something, probably a car purchase.)

My girlfriend in the 90s chose USBank for me, and it was pretty good. I stayed with my account even after moving a few hundred miles away. But there were certain transactions that must be done by involving my "home branch", so I became mindful of that technicality.

How do you deposit paper checks and both deposit and withdraw and cash?

Paper check deposits were mailed for decades, but are now deposited from the mobile app (endorse, take a pic of the front & back, deposit in the app).

Cash withdrawals are done via ATM, just like (presumably) everyone else. My bank refunds all ATM fees (up to some limit that I’ve never hit [looks like it’s $10/mo]).

I don’t have any recurring need to deposit cash; if I needed to deposit cash, I’d have to drive about 90 minutes to the nearest ATM that will take cash (if this was a regular need, I’d find another bank).

Credit unions are regional but they have networks you can interact with. I've lived all over the country with a credit union based out of Ohio with I think less than ten branches. I have no problem finding fee free ATMs, have deposited paper checks both through their app and in network credit unions. The credit union network also offers financial advisors. I've got a mortgage and auto loan through them as well.

Meanwhile my girlfriend's bank doesn't seem to have physical branches, and my bank explicitly returns any money I lose to ATM fees.

Wells Fargo is one of those banks that make cryptocurrency look like a good alternative. And that's saying a lot.

I have my own experience where Wells Fargo put my account, acquired from a Wachovia merger, into a dormant state in an attempt to seize my funds. I removed all my funds after a few tirades over the phone cleared the status and closed the account. I always cringe when Wells Fargo buys my loans, which has happened with home loans on two occasions. However they seem to be a reliable loan servicer.

It seems that WF can do whatever they want because they are considered too big too fail. See also https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/wells-fargo-penalties-reflect...

I stopped using WF over 10 years ago because they did some really messed up things to me. Nice to see they haven't changed one bit.

Same here, but longer than 10 years go. Like 30 years ago. Never again.

That's why I said "over".

If you're reading this and you're still choosing to bank with such a corrupt entity... why?

Mostly momentum for me.

I have a checking account with them that's been active since the early 90's. Lots of bill pay stuff, and automated transfers and such that I really don't feel like mucking with getting transferred somewhere else.

Also, I know this hasn't been other's experience, but they've been pretty excellent for me to deal with over the years. Their online banking works well, and customer support has been great.

I'm not thrilled with some of the nonsense fees I've seen crop up, but a phone call has gotten them reversed.

Based on their public earnings statement [1] they're financially strong, with almost 5 billion in net income in q2, with a 4B stock buyback. This is another thing I like about them, they are very fiscally conservative - they were one of the few banks that didn't take bailout money in '08.

I see the news articles and stuff, but I tend to ignore those things. I've seen so many coordinated media attack campaigns, that I just don't trust it anymore. I'll never forget the fiasco of the coordinated attack campaign against Tesla that turned out to be backed by billionaires that took a short position against Tesla stock.

Especially with financial sector stuff, I don't understand what sorts of powerful hidden forces are set out to influence my perception. So I have to base my decisions on my personal experience, which over the past 30 years has been generally pretty good, at least as good as what I've experienced at other banks.

[1] https://www08.wellsfargomedia.com/assets/pdf/about/investor-...

Breadth of services that are somewhat integrated and available via the web. I've had some fairly negative experiences with them over the years but I haven't figured out a good replacement.

Even Chase is a better choice.

They have tons of branches and ATM?

Not sure why you're being downvoted. This is literally the only reason a relative of mine uses them.

I believe that the days of ATMs, and branches, are numbered.

Do most banks/credit unions not refund ATM fees? Mine has for ages, up to some absurd amount per month. It's like every ATM is my ATM.

Lots of hate for Wells Fargo's business practices in this thread (which they deserve), but this really feels like a standard technical screwup. The interesting question is if their sales-hungry culture also led to a risky tech culture.

Wells Fargo is no longer entitled to benefit of the doubt at this point.

From the outside, their backend tech has loopholes they don’t notice that bleed money for them.

I had a pair of modest-sized accounts with them that I didn’t use much. I kept them at $3000 to avoid hitting monthly minimums and paying fees.

My mortgage then got sold to them and linked to the two accounts. This qualified me to have no monthly minimums. I drained some of the money back to my main bank accounts elsewhere.

I refinanced the mortgage; then I had no mortgage with them anymore. Yet I then received paper statements for years and years, for a pair of accounts with $0 and $0.05, paying no minimum balance fees before I finally bothered to close them.

I didn’t mind (“bank error in your favor!”), but I wasn’t impressed by whoever coded that up. Perhaps there was a good reason they left the loophole, but it didn’t seem a well designed system if so…

The comedian Geoffrey Asmus does a great bit about the Wells Fargo corruption:

https://www.youtube.com/shorts/B3PCkW-LDXY

Knowing what I know about how software is actually developed in real life, I'm surprised it's taken so long for this to happen.

Honest question: Which bank do you recommend? Other big banks, online banks, local banks?

I recommend banking with a brokerage whose primary service is the brokerage product. I personally use Schwab. They'll provide banking services in addition to the brokerage services, but where they really make money is in the brokerage side, via net interest on funds from cash sweep, PFOF, running their own ETFs and collecting the management expenses, etc. They care about having good banking services because they want you to use their brokerage services, but don't care about pumping numbers specifically for the banking product, which WF seems to be incentivized to do seeing as they keep doing it despite fines.

For schwab in particular, their app is pretty good and their phone support is excellent - native english speakers who have the power to actually fix problems. I accidentally deposited post-tax money into a pre-tax retirement account an expected it to be a huge PITA to get it fixed, but the support guy fixed it in a single short phone call for me. Also have had great support regarding wiring funds both in and out, e.g. for receiving proceeds of a stock sale from shareworks and paying for a house.

Fidelity. Tax advantaged accounts, taxable accounts, Cash Management Account (checking account replacement). Refunded ATM fees (if cash is your thing), free wires.

Your local credit union. Not-for-profit. Low to zero fees. Why anyone would use a commercial bank I do not understand.

I banked with two credit unions and both nickel-and-dimed me with ridiculous fees. A coworker of mine has filed suit against the credit union at my current job.

I have banked with a huge commercial bank for the past twenty years and never had any issues. YMMV

My experience is the opposite - Chase nickle and dimed me and made me pay fees if I didn't jump through certain hoops. It made me go back to my credit union.

Yeah I use a local credit union and they are not the worst but they have fees and will hit you with overdraft penalties and whatnot like any bank.

For the record I have not used a credit union for close to 10 years so this may be different now.

But there is something to be said about having an actually usable banking website, modern ATMs, and most importantly some support options during non business hours when something goes wrong.

Also being able to reliably find a branch if you are traveling.

While you can argue that support at a credit union may be better when you can get it, there are real advantages to going with a major bank.

Also as someone else said... the fees, minimum balances, etc were ridiculous.

Also for the record, I only tried one but I really didn't feel like making the jump to another bank if the second one didn't work out well.

Within the last 15 years or so, a bunch of the Credit Unions have 1) modernized their online banking stuff and 2) formed some sort of sharing agreement with regards to physical locations and ATMs. The one that I notice as a little odd is that the alliance that my CU belongs to partnered with the company that supplies ATMs to 7-11 stores. Which is always funny to see when I pull up their ATM map.

Though I get most of my cash through free cashback when I do grocery shopping or whatever.

> But there is something to be said about having an actually usable banking website, modern ATMs, and most importantly some support options during non business hours when something goes wrong

An example of all of this wrapped up in a credit union in California - School's First Credit Union.

What's great about modern banks/credit-unions is the ability to issue cards that can use payment processors like Mastercard (school's first uses this), making almost every ATM work for you. I was able to make purchases in London without doing anything special.

The account monitoring is also top-notch. I buy gas, driving up to San Francisco and someone buys some shoes in Los Angeles when I had just stopped in San Jose, I get a phone call. I try to purchase more than $X with the card, it won't go through without me allowing it (you can configure your max daily, ofc). Loan rates are great. It goes on and on.

I just don't understand why anyone uses big banks anymore.

You really think these kind of things haven't markedly changed in ten years?

I moved cities 5 times in 8 years. The last thing I wanted to do is try and evaluate a credit union each time.

I look at it now and think about it, but I have to deal with international things and the last thing I want to deal with is trying to get a hold of my bank from ten timezones over.

Thanks to modern banking, you don't need to be in the same city as your credit union.

I've used the same CU for 20 years, the last 8 of which has been 2000 miles away from it.

Most credit unions are in a network with each other so you can use other CU's ATMs and branches. There are a few limitations, generally around large withdrawals, but the nearest actual branch/ATM of my CU is ~250 miles away and I do just fine. I've done both an auto loan and a mortgage with them without ever having to go into a branch.

I prefer to use large-ish regional banks that cover my state and some territory in nearby states. They’re big enough that service costs are low and offerings are good. But it’s nice to be able to walk into a branch where they’re already familiar with the local economy/industries/markets.

I never understand why people ask questions like this. A lot of people will give you anecdotal responses to this. "I use XYZ and have never had problems".

None of this advice is meaningful or relevant because for every one who has had a good experience, there is going to be someone else who hasn't. It all depends on who responds and isn't a large enough sample size at all. It is about as good as reading reviews on Yelp.

It is generally known that some banks are better than others, and WF is accepted to be on the worse end of the spectrum. So the correct answer in this case is really "any bank except WF".

Until we come up with a solution where you actually control your own funds (or at least it has been put into a DAO, which has its own set of issues), you're always at the whim of whatever bank you choose and even more importantly whatever government you're under, since they can empty your bank account at any time anyway.

Even with Yelp reviews I think my biggest worry is whether or not the reviewer was paid for the review. In this context, it seems reasonable to expect that the anecdotes are at least genuine. Then one is just using their own ability to parse the information in the comments, especially with regard to the specific features that accounts might have and what they’d like to prioritize.

But yeah, a “good enough” bar might be any place that doesn’t have “Wells Fargo” in big red letters on the building (or on their website).

Credit unions and small banks are better, if they can provide the service you need. If they can't, then any large bank that isn't called "Wells Fargo" is a better choice.

Capital one. Best tech for the mobile app, great credit cards (3% back on all food), free ATM all over CVS, Target, 711, etc. Relatively high interest rates (4.3% right now)

I use Schwab and have never had problems

I've been pretty happy with Schwab as well. Free wires and ATM fee refunds if you meet a minimum balance requirement, and their customer service has been solid.

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