Wells Fargo Repossession Law Firm
Wells Fargo Bank Wrongfully Repossessed Twenty Thousand Vehicles
Recently over half a million customers of the bank were scammed for unnecessary automobile insurance.
Picture these small towns with populations of around twenty thousand people. Now picture that the equivalent of the population of one of these towns awoke one Sunday morning to see that all of their vehicles have disappeared. It seems farfetched, doesn't it?
Could something like that really happen? It did actually happen; however, to twenty thousand Wells Fargo clients that bought a car but then had it repossessed wrongfully. How did something like this happen? This scam was the fraudulent addition of insurance fees, which does not sound fraudulent at first because car insurance is necessary. In this case, Wells Fargo added fees for false insurance when customers who had purchased the vehicles already purchased insurance for themselves.
Suggesting that Wells Fargo Bank needs an extreme wake-up call is a drastic understatement. Wrongdoing conducted by Wells Fargo's senior management continues running rampantly, as this is the third report of a major fraud on their banking customers. When the story was revealed and press involvement was looming, the bank made a public admittance of having participated in a several year-long, ongoing, fraudulent practices of business in their automobile financing unit on July 29th.
This admission was the third in three months: first in the branch banking unit, second in the loans for mortgages, and third in the automobile loans. Under the guise of their company policy, five hundred thousand clients were charged wrongfully for automobile insurance that they had already selected and financed on their own terms.
The majority of these customers were not in the financial position to pay these illicit fees, which caused them to be declared by Wells Fargo as "in default."
This denotation of "in default" is what allowed the wrongful repossession and re-selling of customer automobiles. Wells Fargo continues to make attempts to deflate the criminal tones of their business practices across their company.
On the company website, a statement was released claiming that Wells Fargo was going to remediate the situation with their customers and their automobile insurance coverage.
The official position of the financial institution is that Wells Fargo Bank announced a strategy that would resolve the issues with auto loan customers" of their dealer services that were potentially hurt financially as a result of the issues that were related to the bank's automobile collateral protection insurance plans (CPI plans).
Let's take a closer look at the corporation's double language… 1) potentially hurt financially Wells Fargo demanded payment for car insurance that clients did not select, did not require, and were not required to provide payment for; yet, the words that the bank used suggested potential damage.
The bank, in some cases, stole and then re-sold vehicles; yet, the statement suggests a chance of harm to the client. Wells Fargo does not mention the immense frustration that results when a working family's vehicle is fraudulently taken- bills do not get paid, which causes marriages and families to suffer or crumble.
2) As a result of problems with [Wells Fargo plans and regulations]"Definitions from bankpolicies.com state:- Policy: a high-level plan that recognizes a bank's directives and overall goals. This document with the related topic must be subject to senior management and board of directors' approval.
Wells Fargo stated that the bank did develop a high-level plan of operations to force unnecessary, expensive insurance onto their clients; their plan was approved by appropriate senior management and their board of directors. The bank's clients are made of up service members, veterans, and working families.
This plan's end goal was the extraction of fees to grow profit, unearned profit. The highest level of management at Wells Fargo created a plan to rob millions from their clients through false charges to grow their own profit.
It was not an issue in their system; rather, it was a conscious plan enforced as a way to rob their clients. Wells Fargo knew that many customers would be labeled "in default," allowing their vehicles to be taken and sold at an auction.
Wells Fargo does claim to have put an end to this insurance plan a year ago, but they did not explain the true circumstances surrounding the plan for a full year.
Due to this year wait, the time limits for those that were wrongfully affected to bring an action against Wells Fargo may be shortened.
Due to a clause in Wells Fargo finance contracts called mandatory arbitration, going to arbitration may be required of you. If Wells Fargo bank has treated you fraudulently or you have any inquiries about your account with Wells Fargo, please do reach out to our law firm for a Case Review that is free of charge.
