How to report a bank for discrimination against bitcoin.

Banks often discriminate against bitcoin users. There are many reasons for this.

  • Banks see bitcoin as competition
  • Unclear or contrary regulations regarding bitcoin
  • Potential money laundering
  • Legitimate fraud concerns

Regardless of the reason, banks often close accounts that are involved in bitcoin transactions and ban the account holder. They may give a variety of excuses or simply send the generic “we reserve the right to end our relationship at anytime” letter.

You do have some recourse. The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau offers an easy way to file a complaint against financial services and banks online. Banks do take these complaints seriously because they are often used in later actions against banks by both the US government and lawyers in the civil courts as evidence that banks are not operating fairly.

You can file a complain here
http://www.consumerfinance.gov/complaint/

When filing a complaint here are a few tips to get the best response to your complaint

  1. Use good English, proper spelling and grammar. A great way to do this is to write it out in a document editor like Google Docs or Microsoft Word.
  2. Keep your complaint short and to the point with details (dates, who you spoke to). People listen to and believe someone that sounds intelligent and knows what they are talking about
  3. DO NOT LIE OR EXAGGERATE. If the banks can prove one part of your complaint is not 100% true, that will cause all of your complaint to look suspicious.
  4. Point out that you have done nothing wrong and the bank gave you no warning or chance to take corrective action. State that you used the bank account for exactly what it was intended for and explain how you used it.

In the next few days we will post links to templates below. You will be able to use these templates for your complaint. Our hope is that when enough people file these complaints corrective actions will be taken against the banks.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.