Looks like ish hit the fan pretty hard for Wells Fargo, after the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau reported that employees had opened over two million fake bank accounts! Wayment!!!
So basically Wells Fargo has to now pay back a whopping $185 million in fines after employees thought it was a smart idea to open 1.5 million fake deposit accounts in order to meet their daily sales goals. Apparently these practices have dated back to as far as 2011.
“Employees then transferred funds from consumers’ authorized accounts to temporarily fund the new, unauthorized accounts,” wrote the CFPB in a press release. “This widespread practice gave the employees credit for opening the new accounts, allowing them to earn additional compensation and to meet the bank’s sales goals.”
To make things worse, employees would take money from already existing accounts in order to fund the new fake accounts, leaving customers with overdraft fees if their funds became insufficient after the unauthorized withdrawal. Too bad the bad only gets worse.
via Complex:
Employees also applied for 565,000 credit cards without customer permission, also resulting in fees for customers who had no idea the card was opened in their name. About 14,000 of those accounts made over $400,000 in fees for the bank, including overdraft protection fees. Employees went so far as to issue fake debit cards and activated them with fake pins.
Employees also used fake email addresses to open numerous accounts as well. Back in 2013, ex Wells Fargo employee, Rita Murillo told the LA Times about the constant pressure to meet goals while working at the bank.
“We were constantly told we would end up working for McDonald’s. If we did not make the sales quotas…we had to stay for what felt like after-school detention, or report to a call session on Saturdays.”
Either way, if you’re not cut out for the job why not find another one? Tell us your thoughts, lets chat below!
