California Looks Into Allegations Wells Fargo Signed Up Customers For Life Insurance

And the hits keep on coming for Wells Fargo. California has joined in the lawsuit bandwagon, ordering an investigation into claims retail bankers at Wells Fargo signed customers up for life insurance polices without their consent.

Dave Jones, the insurance commissioner for California, said in an interview with Reuters that retail bankers allegedly signed up customers without their knowledge for life insurance from Prudential Financial. Jones said his office will launch an investigation. Prudential Financial, for its part, has reportedly suspended sales of low-cost life insurance policies via Wells Fargo until it can investigate how the insurance product was sold via Wells Fargo.

Earlier this fall, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau fined Wells Fargo $185 million, the largest fine levied from the government agency. It also ordered Wells Fargo to refund $5 million in fees that the bank wrongly charged customers. According to an investigation by the CFPB, Wells Fargo employees not only made fake deposit accounts but also submitted 565,443 unauthorized credit card account applications on behalf of unknowing customers. It’s estimated that 14,000 of those accounts accrued $403,145 in fees. Through its own independent investigation, the bank discovered a total of $2.6 million in unauthorized fees. Since then, the company’s CEO, John Stumpf, was forced to step down.

More recently, Bloomberg reported lawsuits against Wells Fargo due to the fake account scandal have widened to include more higher-ups in the bank. A lawsuit is under way regarding an area president who told employees to open fake accounts to raise sales. The area president allegedly told employees to “do whatever it takes” to meet the sales goals and stay employed, reported Bloomberg, citing the lawsuit, which was brought by former branch managers. Two named in the lawsuit, Lefky Mansi, an area president in the Los Angeles region, and Shabnam Ebrahimi, a district manager, allegedly told employees their careers were at risk after they complained to federal agencies, as well as the human resources department, about the managers telling them to open fake accounts.