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Industry Spotlight > Wirehouse Firms

Wells Fargo Customers Report Account Outages — Again

By Dinah Wisenberg Brin

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What You Need to Know

  • The snags followed glitches at Wells Fargo earlier this month and in March.
  • Bank retail clients reported problems using their bank debit cards and transferring funds, for instance.

Customers at Wells Fargo took to social media Thursday to report problems transferring funds and using their debit cards. The news comes about three weeks after clients complained about deposits that appeared to be missing from their bank accounts.

Downdetector, a website where consumers can report problems with banks, fintech platforms and other companies, logged 756 outage reports for Wells Fargo shortly after 5 p.m. Eastern Daylight Time, compared with a normal outage level of four.

The reports seemed to start about an hour and a half earlier, according to a graphic on the site. At about 6:30 p.m. EDT, the level of Wells Fargo complaints fluctuated between roughly 540 and 725, per the Downdetector graphic.

“We are aware that some customers are experiencing intermittent issues with certain transactions. Our teams are working diligently to resolve. We apologize for any inconvenience,” Wells Fargo said in a statement shared with ThinkAdvisor via email at 6.30 p.m. EDT Thursday.

On Friday morning, Downdetector complaint reports for Wells Fargo had subsided to roughly 60, while posts on the site indicated some customers continued to face difficulty with their accounts.

In early August, some Wells Fargo customers said recent deposits appeared to be missing from their accounts; the company largely resolved the issue by the following day. Wells Fargo account holders reported similar problems in March.

Client Complaints

Downdetector users and those on X, formerly known as Twitter, posted descriptions of the problems they were facing at Wells Fargo late Thursday.

These included someone who claimed they had money in their account but their ATM card wasn’t working and who complained about looking like a “deadbeat” after a waitress said the card had been declined.

Another Wells Fargo client posted on Downdetector that they’re on a family vacation far from home, their debit card was declined multiple times when they ordered dinner, and they couldn’t transfer money between accounts.

The wait time to call was over an hour, according to this poster, who said they had “over 6 figures” in their Wells Fargo accounts and “will be removing every single dollar” when they return home. “This is the last straw.”

Several Wells Fargo clients reported that transfers between accounts weren’t working. On X, a user posted she couldn’t transfer money to her son at college to buy groceries, school supplies and books.

“Thank you for bringing this to our attention. It’s important that you are able to send your son money. We are experiencing an error however, technical teams are aware and working to resolve this issue,” Wells Fargo’s customer support account on X responded.

On Friday, one Downdetector user reported that Wells Fargo debit cards and ATM weren’t working, they couldn’t add funds to CashApp, ApplePay or PayPal and couldn’t transfer with Zelle; the poster indicated customer service told them to get cash from a bank branch. Another complained their bills were trying to debit and were being declined.

Meanwhile, money transfer app Zelle had drawn over 100 complaint reports shortly before 6 p.m. Thursday, per Downdetector. Someone on X asked whether the “Wells Fargo Zelle” transfer tool was down, then followed up that a friend had “Zelled” them money but the Wells Fargo app was down.

Issues at Other Banks

Retail customers of other financial institutions, such as California-based Varo Bank, seemed to be hitting snags as well late Thursday; about 200 Varo clients, for instance, said they were having issues at 6.30 p.m. EDT on Downdetector.

“We’re currently experiencing issues with some card transactions being delayed or declined. We have been notified and are resolving this as quickly as possible,” Varo said in a tweet.

In another tweet Friday, Varo, replying to a customer who had problems with internal transfers Thursday, said: “We were experiencing issues with some internal transfers and some card transactions being delayed or declined, but have since resolved the issue. Please try the transfer or transaction again.”

Dowdetector indicated ongoing problems at Varo on Friday, with outage reports in a roughly 140 to 160 range around 10 a.m.

PNC Bank customers also reported account glitches, including zero balances, and an inability to use their ATM cards or to withdraw or transfer funds, in early August.

Image: Bloomberg

Dinah Wisenberg Brin

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