LINCOLN, R.I. (WPRI) — When Pilar Coelho of Lincoln checked her Citizens Bank account Wednesday morning, she was shocked to find it was overdrawn by $125.
“When I looked at the charges, I noticed an annual fee charge through Ring, my doorbell, a yearly subscription, and I’m like wait a minute, I already paid that,” Coelho said, noting other duplicate charges on her account.
And she’s not alone.
“I was freaking out,” said Sadie Hughes, another local Citizens Bank customer who realized her account was in the negative Wednesday morning.
“People have bills to pay. There are some people who have no gas in their car because they can’t pay to put gas in their car,” Hughes said. “What are we supposed to do?”
A number of customers reached out to 12 News, complaining about large sums of money missing from their accounts.
Citizens Bank said on its website it was working to resolve an issue that caused duplicate transactions on some customer accounts.
“We are aware that some customers are seeing debits or credits posting twice to their accounts,” said an automated message that played when 12 News called the Citizens Bank helpline. “Please be assured that we are working to correct the issue as quickly as possible and there’s no action you need to take.”
Story continues below video.
The company has also been responding to complaints on social media, blaming a technical posting issue that caused duplicate transactions.
Local financial planner Jeff Massey has accounts at Citizens. While he wasn’t impacted, he urged those who were to remain patient as the bank worked to correct the issue.
“It would be prudent to not make any charges, give it a few days,” Massey suggested. “If you do make a charge, watch it. Go online and see what was taken out. Was it appropriate? Was it charged twice?”
Some affected customers told 12 News by Wednesday night the duplicate charges were gone and it was as if nothing had happened. But for many, the charges remain.
Citizens has not provided an exact timeline for when the issue would be resolved.
12 News reached out repeatedly to the company for information about how many people were impacted and what may have caused the issue, but have not yet heard back.
