Fifth Third Bank Sued for Consumer Fraud

Fifth Third Bank, a national banking association headquartered in Illinois, Ohio, has recently been sued for unlawful practices of consumer fraud. The class action lawsuit seeks to represent anyone in the United States who had a financial account or product opened in their name by a Fifth Third employee without their lawfully-obtained authorization. On their behalf, this class action aims to recover damages under the Fair Credit Reporting Act (“FCRA”) as well as the Illinois Consumer Fraud Act (“ICFA”) and other state law claims.

For years, the bank had imposed aggressively ambitious sales goals onto its employees with regard to new products and accounts being opened. If the employees met these goals, they were handsomely rewarded, and if not, their performance ratings were negatively impacted. Due to this strategy used to increase products and services sold to existing customers, the ICFA and FCRA were willfully violated by Fifth Third Bank. Some of the alleged violations committed without the consumers knowledge or consent include, but were not limited to: opening accounts in consumers’ names; transferring funds from consumers’ existing accounts to new, improperly opened accounts; issuing credit cards; enrolling consumers in online- banking services; and opening lines of credit on consumers’ accounts. These actions caused unsuspecting customers to be charged fees for many or all of the unauthorized accounts opened without their consent. Additionally, because the bank was unlawfully accessing consumer credit reports in order to open fraudulent accounts without customer consent, consumer credit scores were negatively affected.

While thousands of customers were trusting this institution with their hard-earned money, the bank willfully chose to expose them to unlawful practices risking them financial harm. Unfortunately, it has become all too common to have banks promote self-enrichment practices at the expense of their own customers. If you are a customer of Fifth Third Bank and would like to know if you are eligible to join this case, you can reach our firm, Fitapelli & Schaffer, LLP, at (212) 300-0375. Also, If you feel that your bank has been opening accounts or products without your authorization, you may have a claim for consumer fraud. Call us for a free consultation or view our web page here.

Additionally, you can view the filed complaint here.