Bank of America Settlement

I found a great article on the Bank of America Settlement with the FTC.

In my last post I noted the beginnings of some positive movement by consumer protection agencies that have been largely dormant and, in some cases like the United States Trustee program, actively anti-consumer. A few weeks ago, as Katie Porter noted in a recent post, Bank of America (BOA) reached a settlement with the Federal Trade Commission with respect to certain mortgage overcharges, including overcharges in bankruptcy, on mortgages formerly serviced by Countrywide Mortgage. The settlement requires reimbursement to consumers who were overcharged. BOA, in addition to agreeing not to lie, steal, or file documents without reviewing them, will also have to follow notice procedures similar to those that are already required or are likely to be required for all mortgage companies once new Bankruptcy Rule 3002.1 becomes effective in December, 2011. The United States Trustee (UST) Program assisted the FTC in its efforts. This settlement is the first significant positive result of increased UST scrutiny of mortgage lenders, although the extent of the UST’s participation is not known.

To read the rest of the article go to http://www.creditslips.org/creditslips/2010/07/bank-of-america-settlement-with-ftc-raises-some-questions.html#more

Bank of America

I just had to share this with all of you.  I found it at http://showdowninamerica.org/edda-lopez-petition

Edda Lopez entered into an agreement with her previous mortgage company under a federal program, the Home Affordable Modification Program.

Edda complied with the three-month trial period and was then notified that her trial-period mortgage payment would be fixed for the next five years, at $2100/mo.

Unfortunately, once Bank of America took over the servicing of her mortgage, they reneged on this agreement, and increased her payments to $3100/mo. When Edda called Bank of America to find out why her payments had increased, she was told that her home was already in foreclosure and set to auction on June 28.

It is difficult to interpret Bank of America’s decision as being anything other than willfully cruel. Ms. Lopez is a disabled widow who nonetheless complied with her agreed-upon mortgage amount, and is now facing homelessness after living in her home since 1996.

If you agree with me that this is wrong, please go to http://showdowninamerica.org/edda-lopez-petition and sign the petition.

Good news for some homeowners

In a press release from the FTC it was announced that Countrywide, who was accquired by Bank of America in 2008, will be paying $108 million to homeowners who were struggeling to keep their homes and Countrywide collected exsessive fees from.

“Life is hard enough for homeowners who are having trouble paying their mortgage. To have a major loan servicer like Countrywide piling on illegal and excessive fees is indefensible,” said FTC Chairman Jon Leibowitz. “We’re very pleased that homeowners will be reimbursed as a result of our settlement.”

The bank took advantage of the fact that these people were in an emotional place while they were making these choice because they feared that they could loose their home.  They trusted what the bank employees were telling them, and as my husband and I learned years ago, you cannot always trust that the information that they are giving you is true and accurate, even when you think you are asking the right questions.

To read all of the information on this case and the settlement with the FTC, you can go to
http://ftc.gov/opa/2010/06/countrywide.shtm

Bank of America

Are you one of the millions of Americans who would love to tell the big banks what you think of their policies and procedures? Now is your chance!

Tomorrow a group from the PICO National Network will be meeting with Bank Of America executives for a face to face conversation about the problems that they have caused for so many people. They need your help . . . if you have a Bank of America story, go to http://action.seiu.org/page/s/bofameeting to submit your story. The more stories that they have, the more that they can try to hold Bank of America accountable for.

Every home owner must read!

I am re-posting a blog from Denise Richardson of GiveMeBackMyCredit.com because I feel that this story needs to be seen by everyone.

http://www.givemebackmycredit.com/blog/2009/12/another.html

Florida homeowners Sara and Moshe have been working tirelessly trying to save their home from a wrongful foreclosure brought about by BofA's erroneous accounting practices. Sadly, Sara and Moshe are just one of countless families across the country who reports their frustrations with big banks over bad accounting practices, mismanaged loans, and borrower loan modification runarounds.

In Florida the news is the same. Hundreds if not thousands of aggravated Florida homeowners filed complaints with Florida Attorney General Bill McCollum against Bank of America for stalled home mortgage loan modifications.

Below, Sara and Moshe share their ongoing frustrations over Bank of America's inability to properly account for their monthly mortgage payments -payments that were made timely AND at a Bank of America branch, but continue to be reported to the credit bureaus as late and even prompted a letter indicating their loan was now on an accelerated track for foreclosure.

As they continue to fight to protect their rights and force Bank of America to properly account for their loan payments, correct their inaccurate credit reporting they share their story here;

Bank of America has reared its ugly head and is making our lives miserable!
By Sara Yoel & Moshe Rozenblum

Bank of America is not only going after legitimate foreclosures, but they are now targeting innocent homeowners. We should know because we are one of them.

Let me tell you how bad BOA is and to what extent they are willing to go to increase their bottom line profits.

Our mortgage was obtained through "Countrywide" back in 2005 and BOA took over Countrywide earlier this year. After learning of President Obama's program to help homeowners modify their loans, we dared only ASK them back in March 2009 about a modification of our mortgage based on economic change and hardship. Nevertheless, we continued to make our payments every month and on time. We never missed a payment not one. However, all hell broke loose anyway. It appears that instead of helping us homeowners with the billions of stimulus money they received, they decided it would be more beneficial for them to ignore our request for possible loan modification and proceed to harass us.

First they claimed in March that they did not receive our payment, which was not true, because upon learning of their claim that they never receive a payment I made a second payment over the phone, and put a stop payment on the earlier payment. Oops! They suddenly found that missing payment and applied that too, along with late fees too. After months of arguing with them over this, they finally removed the misapplied fees.

On our July/09 monthly statement they showed that we owed them one month payment, we did not, because after they claimed they had not received our last month's check, as of June/09 we started making payments in person at their own bank and we have their receipt to prove it. Again, I was forced to make more calls and pleas for their help in correcting their erroneous accounting.

In August we all of a sudden received a "Notice to accelerate" our mortgage, which means they are going to proceed with foreclosure. Remember, we have NOT been late and do not owe them any past due monies -ever -we are up to date.

Feeling drained, emotionally beaten and fearful that our home was being stolen out from under us, we immediately went to consult an Attorney who made a call to them and lo and behold, they said it is all a mistake and they will correct it. Yes, they corrected it, but we would learn that would be just briefly.

Later on, after making our September payment, two weeks later we received a second "Notice to accelerate" for a different amount owed.

Through the months of March through August none of our letters (Certified!), faxes, emails and phone calls were ever returned. We sent a second letter (priority mail) from another Attorney in September/09 requesting an answer and correction, but they never bothered to respond.
The nightmare for us (the fun for them) was just getting started. Mid October we noticed again that our payments were not applied to our account, and have continued until the present (now December 2009). As of this month, they are showing that we owe them in access of $ 8,000 which is three months of mortgage payments; we do not owe a penny! We have made every payment we owe, and on time.

But the worst was yet to come.

They reported these erroneous late payments to all three credit reporting agencies and succeeded in destroying our excellent credit (in the high 700's score).

As a consequence, we have already been denied credit and or have had our credit cut off, due to the negative (erroneous) reporting in our credit file with the credit reporting agencies. You also think that filing a dispute with the credit reporting agencies might help while you can prove your innocence, No way! Absolutely wrong! We tried and still are trying. They refuse to help consumers. It is a joke to think that they will practice due process, or help us in correcting inaccurate information that harms our credit rating. It doesn't matter to them. They will continue to sell and disseminate this harmful and inaccurate credit file, whether it harms us or not because they profit from selling it.

We complained to every government agency possible: OCC of the Treasury Department that handles N.A. Banks, the Florida State Attorney General, the FTC, but none has come through yet with any help.

Bank of America has a duty to handle my mortgage properly, but they are not. We believe Bank of America is outright harassing us, intimidating us and trying to steal our home. Bank of America you can't steal our home, not without us fighting to do all we can to stop you from doing this to us and other innocent homeowners!

Just a reminder, they never even bothered to contact us or respond in any shape or form regarding the request for a loan modification. They are probably having a good laugh at our expense, but we hope that just maybe we will be the ones who will laugh last.

Sara Yoel & Moshe Rozenblum

More scam emails

Don't you love it when Banks use gmail accounts

Subject: BANK TO BANK TRANSACTION FOR YOU
From: makanabenson5@gmail.com
Reply To: makanabenson55@gmail.com

I am Mr. Makana Benson A manager with one of the majorbanks in South Africa.

I am in a position to Move a chunk of money out of the vault of my bank although legally. The money was owned by a customer who died long ago and we couldn't get trace of anyone to claim his money, despite desperate search for a next of kin.

The rules and ethics of our banking regulations demandsthat, after 8yrs of unclaimed funds (money) themoney would be forfeited to the Bank and declared surplusand paid into the states accounts.

Since I am the manager who is in charge of this unclaimed money, I have perfected legaly means ofmaking you stand as the next of kin to the late fellowas a foreigner.

This is risk free as all legal backings are present and would be detailed to you once I have gained your trust and certainty that we can be friends and trust in you. You would be handsomely rewarded with 30% of the total sum.

I will disclose some vital information about the late owner 0f the funds and how he died and the name of my bank once I have gained your trust. I expect your utmost response to this email.

Please in your reply let me have your contact telephone numbers so I can call you and explain more to you.

Makana Benson

Bank of America television commercial

Over the weekend I saw a new television commercial for Bank of America, in which they were talking about their new mobile banking and how wonderful it is. They had different people, who I assume we were supposed to believe are bankers, that were listing off all of the great features.

Now, none of this would have ruffled my feathers, until one of the people was talking about the different kinds of alerts that you can be sent, and he said that you could be sent an alert that tells you when a check clears. WHAT!?!?! How is that possible when

1) The employees in the bank cannot even really tell you when a check is clear. The best that they can tell you is that they have not found any holds or issues with the check yet. Oh don’t get me wrong, they will say the words “the check is clear” but that does not mean it has been authorized, approved or without obstructions . . . which by the way are some of the dictionary’s definitions of the word “clear”.
2) The term clear does not really mean anything in the world of banking. A check will show as “clear” until a problem comes up with it, so it could be clear today, and then be found to be counterfeit the very next day.

If we look up the term clear from The Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis, a place that should know it’s banking terminology, we find this . . .

check clearing
The movement of a check from the depository institution at which it was deposited back to the institution on which it was written, the movement of funds in the opposite direction, and the corresponding credit and debit to the accounts involved. Check clearing also encompasses the return of a check (for insufficient funds, for example) from the bank on which it was written to the bank at which it was deposited, and the corresponding movement of funds. The Federal Reserve Banks operate a nationwide check-clearing system.
http://www.minneapolisfed.org/glossary.cfm

So you can see, by the definition in banking terms, check clearing merely describes the process of the check moving through the system, and no where in it does it say that check clearing means that the check has finished that process or that it is “authorized, approved or without obstructions”.

So why, when banking customers ask a bank employee “How long until I will know if this cashier’s check is good?” do the bank employees respond with comments like “The check will be clear in 24 hours.” And, why is Bank of America is promoting that one of the wonderful functions of their new mobile banking service is that you can be told when a check is “clear” if as we have just seen from the information about “clear” does not really tell you anything about the authenticity of the check or that payment has been received.

That would be a better function . . . if it could notify you when payment has been received and collected by the issuing bank and the cehck was proven authentic.