ID Theft/fraud and Citizen's bank won't help me

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seeker12

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Hello.
My (former & current) employers pay us via direct deposit. One payda last month, I went to withdraw money from my checking account to find out there was almost nothing there! I recognized a few of the charges as being mine, but there were multiple withdrawals from companies I have never heard of before.

I called my bank (Citizen's) asap, and explained the situation to them. I also asked them to put a hold on the account (I could not close it right away until my new employers changed my direct deposit info...) and I also asked them to not permit certain charges to go through from these unknown businesses.

I assumed they would comply. But they repeatedly let charges from the same companies go through over and over again, continually overdrafted my account and charged me 2 seperate overdraft fees of $235.
THIS was even after many phone calls to this company alerting them to what was going on.

I issued a BBB complaint against Citizen's but was only awarded a partial settlement...and the money from the settlement was given to me out of my own father's account! I thought that was pretty nasty of them. When I questioned one citizen's customer service rep about it he glibly told me "Just think of it as your father loaning you the money. haha" :p

FINALLY, I called the branch that I opened the account in and she agreed to Freeze all account activity, and instructed me to come into the bank and fill out an afadavit of fraud asap, and told me that was all she could do for me...
Since that time, I got a semi-substantial lead on who might have done this to me...or at least where the person works.

Well, first of all this I really don't trust my bank. I had a similar situation happen about 8 years ago when a so-called friend stole my check book, and it resulted in this same bank doing little or nothing for me and furthermore a particularly rude customer service agent used scare tactics on me, and warned me that I could be guilty of Fraud myself if it can't be proven.:eek: Finally I talked to someone nicer, but the issue was really never resolved even after that same "Friend" was already arrested for stealing someone else's debit card.

So, my question is? Is there any avenue I can take other than going through the bank to claim ID theft/fraud. It seems like Citizen's looks over their own best interests and not the consumer's, and that they always assume that the customer is wrong...or just trying to get out of oweing them money.

Would I have better luck calling a private detective or filing a claim with the police? Or can I fill out an afadavit on my own, NOT a citizen's afadavit, and fax it to my bank?

Please, let me know.

Thanks,
~Seeker12
 
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I don't know all the facts and we don't have them here. If you didn't recognize the companies withdrawing money from your account, why didn't you put in a fraud investigation immediately? If this was identity theft then there is a process to handle it but it seems you aren't quite sure whether these charges were just unrecognizable to you and not necessarily fraud.
 
Yes, it was identity theft (as opposed to charges that I just didn't recognize). You were right when you said that I should have initiated the fraud investigation ASAP. Truthfully, in my earliest attempts I went about things the complete wrong way--calling the 1-800 number on the back of the atm card was not the way to go. They could do nothing for me. But as I said, I then called the branch where I opened my account and they froze the account, pending my coming in to fill out the afadavit of fraud. My first visit to the bank was a bust--found a girl who was WAY too lazy to help me and suggested I go to another branch and not bug her with it (yeah, real helpful and nice of her!)

Finally, that's what I did. I went into a different branch, and the bank manager helped me with the fraud afadavit and other forms. The bank has reimbursed me for some of what I lost....

Incidentally, the person had also applied for 2 credit cards in my name, and investigations are pending with that too...
There are fraud alerts on my credit reports, and the info on those two cards have been removed from my credit report.



((Sorry for the belatedness of the response))
 
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