Marzena B.

Insufficient Verification in place for customers with no US phone number. I have a checking joint account which has been dormant and for which the bank charges $30/month. I decided to transfer the balance and close the account. Since the first attempt I made multiple calls, spent over 10hrs, was hanged-up on, and was told that I cannot be verified as I do not have an American phone number. I am a Canadian citizen with a Canadian mobile number that all Citibank employees with an exception of one employee from the Fraud Dept. could not reach me. I was told 3 times that the transfer is OK to go through only to get an email that it is on hold and I need to call the bank for verification. So, I called again only to hear that they cannot verify me with my Canadian phone number. I was also told that my September bank charges will be waved but when I logged in, the wire transfer appeared on hold and the account had a negative $30 charge. What is frustrating about this ordeal is the inconsistency process I have been put through. One employee was able to reach me by calling for verification and one was able to use my email for providing a code I had to read back. I have to say that the staff I spoke to was nice; however, based on the outcome I feel that they do not know the process or are poor on problem solving to resolve issues such as mine. I have hard time believing that in current times Citi bank is not serving its customers with international phone numbers who left the country and are at the bank's mercy for verification. Even living by US border with WA State I cannot go to the bank as they do not have any branches there. Based on my experience, I highly suggest not to do business with Citibank as it is not reliable/consistent with customer service information and your interest is not their priority. Escalation to supervisors/managers is futile as well and wasted much of my time as well. If I could give zero stars, I would.