Wells Fargo needs better management, from top level down to line supervisors. Greedy, monopolistic, rude JERKS. Okay, so we have escaped the Balboa loophole to date; and we are two months behind in payments (around $800 total); but tonight I made a valiant effort to rectify the situation and was treated like crap. Here is the email I sent to them, which describes the phone conversation I had with Wells Fargo earlier tonight. Keep in mind that this is a company that, if you are even one day late in making a payment, call numerous times every day until payment is received; I've often logged up to ten daily calls for a week or more. And, because I can never get anywhere with them (because they conveniently claim they haven't gotten authorization from my husband to speak to me), I eventually stopped accepting their calls (hey, it's a cell phone, I need my minutes for other things too, like my TERMINALLY ILL mother). I'm ready to sic my attorney on them for harassment. I cannot WAIT to see how they respond to my email!!!
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First of all, I am sorry to go through this avenue of communication, but tonight when I asked to speak to your agent's supervisor the agent proceeded to hang up on me. I suspect that any other calls I make would receive the same consideration....or lack thereof. Having said that, I respectfully request that you forward this email (either via email or printed form) to the appropriate department SUPERVISOR, not some puissant phone person, as most of your agents wouldn't be able to figure out how to pour water out of a boot if the directions were printed on the heel. Sorry, but I am very upset with Wells Fargo right now, I don't mean to take it out on you, I just want you to understand how I feel about the way I have been treated by Wells Fargo today.
Here is the situation. My husband has had his van financed through Wells Fargo for at least two years now, probably longer (I don't have any of the paperwork as we recently moved and it is still packed somewhere). I also had a car financed through Wells Fargo, and my loan was paid in full when I traded in the car last October. This past spring, we fell behind on many of our bills thanks to a loan officer who didn't know her job (we were trying to buy a house and she essentially screwed us). We did our best to keep up the important bills, such as this one; and it was in arrears a couple of times but had been current as of a few months ago; we were only able to bring it current thanks to my husband's mother, who made a sacrifice in order to help us with this bill. As of today, the account is 68 days past due.
For the past several weeks, Wells Fargo has had absolutely no problem calling MY cell phone numerous times a day (over ten a day at times), yet they will not deign to speak to me, claiming that I am not authorized in the system and they aren't allowed to speak to me. I appreciate that they protect the interests of their clients; but why is it that over the past two years, my husband has had to tell Wells Fargo numerous times that they can talk to me regarding his account, and when they call and I try to handle things I am told they can't find that authorization? The reason this upsets me so much is that I recently started working outside the home full time, something I have not done in almost six years; and for two weeks I have tried to tell Wells Fargo that I could make payment arrangements to bring Jim's account current... yet I am continually told that THEY CANNOT SPEAK TO ME. I would tell Jim (my husband) this, and he would tell me that he did authorize them to speak to me and to call them (them being Wells Fargo). Whether I call or they do, it is always the same thing..."We cannot speak to you without your husband's authorization;" or they would just hang up on me without saying anything. My husband finally got upset enough to call this morning to authorize me AGAIN, and they didn't even TRY to speak to him about the account, just took the info.
Tonight, while I was at work, a lady from Wells Fargo (Amanda?) called me, and asked for Jim. To my surprise, she did speak to me regarding the account; when she indicated that the account was 68 days past due and it was around 1200 to bring it current, before she could continue I offered.. OFFERED... to pay $500 a week for the next three weeks in order to bring it current (and then some). She immediately vetoed this offer, and stated that she HAD to have at least two months' payments by this Friday. I told her that I was not sure I could have that amount by then, and she said "Well it's ONLY another $300." Right now, to me, $300 is a LOT of money, and my family does have to eat. Furthermore, unless she is a supervisor, I don't see how she can just dismiss my offer without first checking with someone in a position of authority. When I worked in customer service and had similar situations, I would have been FIRED had I made a decision that should be left to supervisors to handle.
She stated that she HAD to have the $800 because she could not carry over two late payments into November; I pointed out that if I paid $500 Friday she would only have to carry over ONE late payment, which would come to her two days INTO November. She ignored this, and basically demanded that I give her a check by phone, and I told her that I was not comfortable doing that, mainly because I wasn't sure I would have the funds to cover the check and didn't want to overdraft my account; I added that I didn't have the checkbook with me either, so it was not an option. She then asked if I had a debit card, which I told her I did but did not have it handy as I was at work. At this point, I think she felt I was trying to get out of paying altogether, because the conversation went south fairly rapidly; she said something to the effect of, "So you handle the bills but don't have your checkbook or debit card?" (Note that I did tell her I was at work during this conversation.) She then stated that I HAD to borrow the $300 from someone, which angered me, as she has no RIGHT to make a demand of this nature on me and she has no KNOWLEDGE of my living situation (which includes family and friends); I asked who I was supposed to borrow from and she said something like, "I don't know, family, friends... just GET THE MONEY." I told her I had nobody who could loan me that amount, and she said "Then Jim needs to call me." I replied, "Well Jim can call you and you can ask him for the money, but guess what, all Jim will do is hand the phone over to me, so why don't we just resolve this now?" She got even more surly and asked me if Jim even KNEW just how far behind the account was. I told her, "If he didn't know, why would I let him call your office to authorize me to speak to you?" She kept insisting that she HAD to talk to Jim, and I kept telling her that he will not do anything without first asking me how much we can afford to pay.. and I then reiterated that we can afford $500 but not $800.
At this point, your rep wasn't listening to ANYTHING I had to say, because she was of the mindset that if she could just talk to Jim he would tell her that we could pay the $800 she is demanding... when this is absolutely NOT the case. She then said that she was going to do what she had to do and turn this in for collection (I assume this means potential repossession), and I replied that I would also do what I had to do and talk to her supervisor. When I asked her to transfer me to her supervisor she HUNG UP ON ME. Now I understand that working in collections is not an easy job; but I am appalled at the complete lack of respect your agents offer to their clients. I do not appreciate being hung up on, when I am doing my best to pay this bill? I understand it is two months late; but because I just started my job, I am not sure how much I will be bringing home in a full week of work; and I do not want to stretch our finances beyond what we bring in, as we do incur costly bank fees every time we overdraw. If I give a check for $800 and our total deposit on Friday is less, not only do I incur a costly fee for the returned check, but you will not get the $800.....and this is NOT my goal. I know for a fact that we can handle $500 this week, and I know for a fact that we can handle $500 next week; we may be able to handle more than $500 NEXT week, but I won't know that until I see at least one full paycheck from my job. I know that you want your money, and I want to get it to you; but I don't want to fall behind in every other bill I have doing so, because that is just going to put us into a deeper hole and will most likely affect future payments to Wells Fargo, because this is what happened the last time we fell behind and had to play catch-up.
I am only including my name and cell phone number in this email, as well as my husband's name and type of vehicle; I will not put any identifying information, for security reasons. I respectfully request that you have a SUPERVISOR call me regarding this situation, and please understand that if I am contacted by anybody who is not a supervisor, I will not speak to them; I will ask for a supervisor (after writing down their name), and if they hang up on me as the woman tonight did, I will call back and demand to speak to a supervisor. When I do manage to get a supervisor, they will be in for a very LONG conversation with a very ANGRY customer. I apologize for the length of this email; please have it forwarded to somebody who is willing and able to work with me on this situation. Thank you. |