Business

Wells Fargo Caught Stealing Cars From Deployed Servicemen

Published

8 years ago

September 30, 2016

: Wells Fargo Targets Military Personnel (Image: MGN)

Wells Fargo has done it again but this time, they've done it to service members.
Apparently, the bank has been illegally repossessing service members vehicles.
The company must now pay up to $24 million in retributions.
They are also being fined $4.1 million by the Justice Department.
As well as, $20 million by the OCC.

Just when you thought that Wells Fargo had learned its lesson, they go and do something illegal again. After illegally opening millions of bank accounts and hundreds of thousands of credit cards, you'd think they'd be on their best behavior. Yet, apparently, that's not the case.

The bank is now being forced to pay $24 million to settle the newest allegations against them. What are they, you ask? Wells Fargo is being accused of mistreating Military service members by repossessing their vehicles.

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Not only is the bank paying each affected service member $10,000, but they are also paying the lost equity of the cars with interest and are forced to repair their credit. That is assumedly where the $24 million comes from that was mentioned earlier.

According to the Justice Department, the illegal repossessing took place between 2008 and 2015. An investigation was launched after an Army National Guardsman filed a complaint that the bank repossessed his car while he was preparing to deploy to Afghanistan. After the investigation, the Justice Department found that 413 cars had been repossessed without a court order.

Now, Wells Fargo is also being forced to pay $4.1 million to settle Justice Department charges.

The Office of the Comptroller of Currency (OCC) also fined Wells Fargo $20 million. The OCC discovered that the bank was breaking three provisions of the same law that provided service members certain banking protections. The bank had apparently denied service members these protections. The OCC claimed that the violations had been occurring since 2006.

Wells Fargo released a statement that said, “We have been notifying and fully compensating customers and will complete this work in 60 days.”

This is just one more lawsuit to add to the long list against Wells Fargo. It doesn't seem like the bank has a bright future ahead of itself.