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A DAUGHTER is taking on Wells Fargo after the bank claims there is nothing it can do about the theft of her mother’s life savings from a scam.
Judith Anderson from San Diego, California, was scammed out of $150,000 just before Christmas and is being refused help from the bank.
The 74-year-old has been a Wells Fargo customer for over 50 years and was using the money to pay for her husband’s care and for a place for her to relocate near her daughter Tracy Martinez.
Martinez has been fighting her mother’s corner with the bank and by sharing their story on TikTok.
Anderson had received a phone call from Wells Fargo Bank just days before Christmas and was told that it was the fraud department and that several purchases had been made in Texas which she needed the verify.
The scammers had managed to spoof the caller ID to look like the contact details of Wells Fargo.
When Anderson informed them that she did not make the purchases in Texas she was told to prove her identity and in doing so she gave them all of the information they needed to enter her account.
As part of two-factor authentication, the real Wells Fargo then sent Anderson a text message with a verification code to approve the login which she then read out on the phone.
The scammers then took $150,000 from Anderson’s savings, completely draining her account and Wells Fargo is refusing a refund.
In a TikTok video, Tracy explained that while the issue has been escalated to an executive level, the bank argues that as the username, password, and verification code were used the payment was authenticated
However, Martinez argues that while the bank may not be at fault for her mother’s panicked decision to share personal information, it should have noticed that there was suspicious activity on the account.
“The big red flags for us and why I am really pushing for Wells Fargo to make this right and why I’m not accepting any money from friends and family or even TikTok at this point is because we feel that their systems in place failed us,” Martinez said in a TikTok video update.
“We feel their internal department should have caught this.”
The San Diego realtor detailed the numerous red flags that the bank should have noticed and then taken action to verify with her mother.
Firstly, after gaining access to the account, the scammer changed all account preferences to his email address as well as the password.
Following this, the scammer signed up the account for digital wires.
“My Mom had never used digital wires on her account,” Martinez explained.
“He enrolled her in on two of her accounts so that’s another thing – this activity is taking place.
“That’s odd. She’s never done these things there’s a lot of activity going on in the first 20 minutes.”
Wells Fargo has a digital wire cap of $50,000 meaning that any transfer of this sum or more needs to be done at a bank and the scammer took full advantage of this.
“[He] added two people to these digital wires, once he had the recipients he then started his first wire of $49,000…that’s another red flag to me,” Martinez said.
“Then he sends another $49,000 wire to the same recipient.
“So they have a cap at $50,000 that you have to go in [to the bank] to do that but how $98,000 could have been sent to the same individual on a wire is something I want Wells Fargo to address.”
A second recipient was set up and another $49,000 transfer was made which drained the account but the scammer did not stop there.
“Once the $150,000 was gone and all her cash was gone he started to make draws on [my father’s unused] business line of credit,” Martinez explained.
“Another red flag. This hasn’t been used in years. All of a sudden they are wanting a whole load of cash from their business wire.
This credit wire was intercepted by the bank but Tracy noted that the scammers were active on her mother’s account for over an hour and in the meantime she had called Wells Fargo to flag the situation after her mother called her after getting suspicious.
“Yes, a username and password were utilized, they were compromised, but what happened afterward I hope that never happens,” Martinez said.
“There has to be better safeguards in place and that’s what we are fighting for.”
Viewers of the TikTok video were shocked by the lack of accountability from the bank and the supposed lack of customer protection.
“I have been with Wells Fargo for 10 years. If their fraud dept can miss something this big, I need to switch banks,” one viewer wrote.
“The bank 1000000% should have caught that and frozen the account as soon as things started changing and the signing up for digital wires,” another added.
“Exactly!!!! I use to work in fraud and we would have placed a hold until the customer verified it was them making that request,” one replied.
Others called on Wells Fargo to “do something” for the “poor woman” and questioned the bank’s security and morals.
“My bank alerted me when I was buying donuts in another town,” one viewer said.
“How could Wells Fargo let this happen & not take responsibility?”
Under federal rules, the bank is not obligated to issue a refund to customers who have given account authorization to scammers who then take their money as this is considered verified and authorized by the account holder.
“I feel foolish,” Anderson told NBC News affiliate KNSD.
“I thought I was doing the right thing and it turned out disastrous.”
“We want to see better protections in place for everybody…That is the goal.” Martinez said as she reassured viewers that her mother would be okay.
“We will rebuild together, and we have each other. She’s going to be OK,” she said.
“Scams are an industry-wide concern, and we never want to see anyone become a victim,” Wells Fargo told the news outlet in a statement, ignoring all other questions.
“Through our education efforts, we are actively working to raise awareness of common scams to help prevent these heartbreaking incidents.”
The bank warns users not to trust Caller ID, to not be pressured into a transaction, never to share personal information, and not to be afraid to hang up on the person who contacted them.
Wells Fargo added that it will not call and ask for access codes, PINs, or passwords.
The U.S. Sun has contacted Wells Fargo for comment on its safeguarding policies.
