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I called the Wells Fargo ethics line and was fired

i dont know if charges will be filed

here is the tough part....

was pressure put on employees...absolutely

is there anything illegal about that....nope

were goals set so high that management "should" have known that they couldnt have been reached without employees resorting to scandalous tactics...probably

can it be proven? are there emails, and documents that say management knew what was happening, and allowed it?

or is this all just speculation and that they "should" have known

proving the case is the key....no DA will bring a case where he/she cant prove the case beyond a reasonable doubt

and these people...the executives all have enough money to afford the best attorneys

so...will they be charged? i dunno....is there a provable case?

The tough part is, is being a crappy manager illegal?
 
At what size do anti-trust regulations come to play?

I don't know, but anti-trust is important to be sure.

Anti-trust breaks them up legally though, for a specific reason. The reason IS their size, and they are reduced in size by fracturing it.
Employee/manager ethical violations should be punished, but its not in any way shape or form a similar issue.
 
The tough part is, is being a crappy manager illegal?

nope....

i can fire them, but i cant have them jailed...though god knows i have wanted to on a couple of occasions

and i have had a bunch of them over the years
 
As soon as I heard the # of employees affected, I knew this was widespread.

What an absolute nut-house they had going there. Just so you know people, if you work for complete idiot assholes, you are complacent. Turn them in and get a new job. That's your choice. It sucks to be you, it suck to have to get a new job, it sucks to maybe even get in trouble for doing the right thing, but there it is. Management can only misbehave if employees do what they say. And if its that bad...it will implode one way or another. In this case, spectacularly, and hopefully with some prosecutions...

That's bold talk that doesn't apply during a recession. Ironically enough a recession banks like WF caused, but all the same. It's easy to say that when the economy is good, but these shenanigans started while there was a recession.
 
Find something you are good at, and love, and go to work for yourself.

Or, you can work for someone else and stare at a 8' ceiling the rest of your life.

Most people on this forum will never understand this.
 
Why do you believe people on the board knew intimate details of practices in one small division of a very large corporation?

Even in a 269.000 employees company 5.000 is a large enough number to cause a blip on the p&l. It would be a very bad sign if the board hadn't noticed.
 
Why do you believe people on the board knew intimate details of practices in one small division of a very large corporation?

Is that not similar to excusing a government official who simply says "I have no recollection" when their people get caught doing something bad?

If you have correspondence with management at a company the pays at least part of your salary, you are responsible for the goings on in that company.
 
Yes, I remember how many people defended, and still do, the banks actions when they crashed the economy in 2008. These apologists blamed the borrowers, the government, the regulations, etc. everyone but the banks. These all deserved some of the blame, but so did the banks. Because according to them no way would any private company would act greedy. No way would the banks commit fraud, forgery and cheat it's customers.

These banks are out of control. There needs to be more regulations and some of the Banks Brass being Perp walked to jail.

More regulations! More Regulations!

14333015_1214945588526020_8788103921425760060_n.jpg


Adding more regulations is only going to continue to squeeze out the small banks that don't behave this way, didn't expose themselves to the toxic mortgages, and force ever more consolidation into large banks where this behavior happens.

Ever think that you're approach is making the problem worse and not better?

How about breaking up the big banks into a bunch of smaller, less systemically risky and impactful banks?

Didn't Theodore Roosevelt break up the robber barons of his time?
Shouldn't we consider something similar with the big banks now?
 
That's bold talk that doesn't apply during a recession. Ironically enough a recession banks like WF caused, but all the same. It's easy to say that when the economy is good, but these shenanigans started while there was a recession.
Ethics don't care about a U.S. recession. Good grief, how unethical can you get? We did it because of the U.S. recession?
 
My advice is not to call the ethics line.
 
Ethics don't care about a U.S. recession. Good grief, how unethical can you get? We did it because of the U.S. recession?
I'm stating the facts. When the options are "lose your job during a recession" and "do what many of your peers are doing" it's easy to act unethically. You can only put so much blame on the person doing the bad action when the Wells Fargo management created an environment that kept looking the other way. That's why so many companies are veering away from commissions and generally increasing salaries.
 
My advice is not to call the ethics line.

Right, it's like a fly trap, it smells sweet but its for suckers.

Just so no one here can claim they also didn't know:
If you have legal troubles, get legal counsel (or the internet)

(waits for the "but we can't afford it!" plea). You see counsel, they don't charge for consultation, and if they do, go to a different one. Kind of like when you go to buy your favorite coffee, and they are out, you might you know, go to another store. Its asking a LOT to do the right thing, I know.
 
With fees charged to the phony accounts, the profitability of Wells Fargo increased. This is turn led to a large increase (many millions of dollars) in the value of CEO John Stumpf's Wells Fargo stock holdings.

Stumpf tucked the windfall profit safely away elsewhere, and fired 5,300 employees who were following company orders.

And he had the audacity to tell a Congressional panel in his $1000 suit ... "I'm really sorry."
 
i dont know if charges will be filed

here is the tough part....

was pressure put on employees...absolutely

is there anything illegal about that....nope

were goals set so high that management "should" have known that they couldnt have been reached without employees resorting to scandalous tactics...probably

can it be proven? are there emails, and documents that say management knew what was happening, and allowed it?

or is this all just speculation and that they "should" have known

proving the case is the key....no DA will bring a case where he/she cant prove the case beyond a reasonable doubt

and these people...the executives all have enough money to afford the best attorneys

so...will they be charged? i dunno....is there a provable case?

How many millions do you think she, and other execs made in Stock Options and Bonuses from this scam? How much of that $124 mil 'retirement' was inflated because of of this scam?

was pressure put on employees...absolutely

is there anything illegal about that....nope

I don't understand. There was a scam. WF was accused of and fined for committing illegal practices. The upper bosses put pressure on the lower employees to commit these illegal practices. But you are saying that's not illegal? The 'bosses' did nothing wrong? And because the execs have money the government shouldn't go after them?

Am I reading you right?
 
How, exactly, does tearing up the company help the remaining (not fired for wrongdoing) Wells Fargo employees or the shareholders which likely had no clue that this was happening?

I guess what I'd like to do is see actual criminal charges against real breathing humans for breaking a slew of laws. Instead, what the Feds typically do is announce a settlement with a big fine, and the company isn't ever forced to admit any wrongdoing. The problem is there is no real incentive for an employee like the fired VP to do things the right way, when she can lie, cheat and steal her way to 7 and 8 figure bonuses and a 124 million exit payday, and that's the end of the line. Frog march a few of those people to prison and maybe they'd have something to consider when deciding between breaking the law (and face no real consequences) and collect cumulatively 10s of $millions in bonuses, or follow the law and be poorer.

There are supposed to be claw back provisions in place, and it would have cut this VP's bonus by $85 million or so, but they didn't exercise the provision when they forced her to quit, so she would have "only" earned $40 million as an exit payday extra for cheating her clients. The only reason I can think not to exercise that provision is they do not care about what she did - she was responding to cues from the market and her boss, who responds to the board and shareholders. If Stumpf doesn't keep the share price up, he's fired, and bilking customers allowed him to do that, and maximize his bonuses.

Yes, it's bad for the remaining employees to bring the hammer down on the bank, but if you punish wrongdoing like what happened here, the problem is the wrongdoing, not deciding to drop the hammer on crooks who happily ripped off their own clients.
 
Right, it's like a fly trap, it smells sweet but its for suckers.

Just so no one here can claim they also didn't know:
If you have legal troubles, get legal counsel (or the internet)

(waits for the "but we can't afford it!" plea). You see counsel, they don't charge for consultation, and if they do, go to a different one. Kind of like when you go to buy your favorite coffee, and they are out, you might you know, go to another store. Its asking a LOT to do the right thing, I know.

Yeah. If you genuinely believe you've encountered ethical problems, seek help from outside the company. You may need some legal protections for what may transpire.
 
More regulations! More Regulations!

How about breaking up the big banks into a bunch of smaller, less systemically risky and impactful banks?

Didn't Theodore Roosevelt break up the robber barons of his time?

Shouldn't we consider something similar with the big banks now?

Actually that is the exact type of regulations I was talking about. Break them up into smaller banks.
 
Ethics don't care about a U.S. recession. Good grief, how unethical can you get? We did it because of the U.S. recession?

Not quitting a job because it's run by unethical people due the financial hardships that would cause is not unethical.
 
Not quitting a job because it's run by unethical people due the financial hardships that would cause is not unethical.

The issue wasn't that, it was that they had choices:
1. break the law and/or directly participate in unethical actions themselves
2. leave
3. seek legal counsel

They chose #1. They had other choices. They were hard choices, but aren't you measured when choices are hard, not easy?

Wasn't it hard to reject Nazis when they were in power? (obligatory raising the states to nazis maneuver)
 
Even in a 269.000 employees company 5.000 is a large enough number to cause a blip on the p&l. It would be a very bad sign if the board hadn't noticed.

Are you talking about something completely different? You said that you couldn't believe the Board wouldn't have known about this. Now you're talking about the people who were terminated. People weren't terminated on the same day; they weren't even terminated in the same year. And there isn't any reason to think the Board would know about the setting up of the accounts that the customers didn't know they had.
 
How many millions do you think she, and other execs made in Stock Options and Bonuses from this scam? How much of that $124 mil 'retirement' was inflated because of of this scam?



I don't understand. There was a scam. WF was accused of and fined for committing illegal practices. The upper bosses put pressure on the lower employees to commit these illegal practices. But you are saying that's not illegal? The 'bosses' did nothing wrong? And because the execs have money the government shouldn't go after them?

Am I reading you right?

i put pressure on my employees every month to hit certain sales targets

there is nothing inherently wrong or illegal about that...now if i told them to lie, cheat, or steal their way to those sales, then i am culpable

now...in this case, the bank has admitted to their employees doing scandalous things...opening accounts, moving money, creating fake credit card accounts, etc

the 5000 employees that were fired did the ACTUAL deeds....there is no denying this

what you want is management to pay the price for the deeds of the employees under them....and that may or may not happen

if all that management did was to apply pressure....then there is no illegality for management

if there were emails, documents, and such where management not only knew what their employees were doing, but encouraged it, then you have a case

the question is, do those emails and documents exist?

is there a trail that leads from the doers to the people that "may have" ordered it

the bank have may have put pressure on employees to sell, sell, sell....but unless it can be proved that management knew they were doing so illegally, management may be in the clear
 
More regulations! More Regulations!

14333015_1214945588526020_8788103921425760060_n.jpg


Adding more regulations is only going to continue to squeeze out the small banks that don't behave this way, didn't expose themselves to the toxic mortgages, and force ever more consolidation into large banks where this behavior happens.

Ever think that you're approach is making the problem worse and not better?

How about breaking up the big banks into a bunch of smaller, less systemically risky and impactful banks?

Didn't Theodore Roosevelt break up the robber barons of his time?
Shouldn't we consider something similar with the big banks now?

Elizabeth Warren's CFPB and also Dodd-Frank have made it very hard for small banks to exist and do business anymore. The regulatory burdens are the same on them as they are on Wells and Bank of America. That's what makes Warren the world's biggest hypocrite as she sits there, wagging her finger at these people, when all the while she's making it so that in 15 years, it will be only the big banks left in this country.
 
but if you punish wrongdoing like what happened here, the problem is the wrongdoing, not deciding to drop the hammer on crooks who happily ripped off their own clients.

I'm genuinely curious though, what legal recourse can be used for such punishment. Maybe there is a lot that could be done, but it seems like there isn't. In which case, the issue is not that they are not being punished, its that there is no law with which to punish them...which is a political issue?
 
i put pressure on my employees every month to hit certain sales targets

there is nothing inherently wrong or illegal about that...now if i told them to lie, cheat, or steal their way to those sales, then i am culpable

now...in this case, the bank has admitted to their employees doing scandalous things...opening accounts, moving money, creating fake credit card accounts, etc

the 5000 employees that were fired did the ACTUAL deeds....there is no denying this

what you want is management to pay the price for the deeds of the employees under them....and that may or may not happen

if all that management did was to apply pressure....then there is no illegality for management

if there were emails, documents, and such where management not only knew what their employees were doing, but encouraged it, then you have a case

the question is, do those emails and documents exist?

is there a trail that leads from the doers to the people that "may have" ordered it

the bank have may have put pressure on employees to sell, sell, sell....but unless it can be proved that management knew they were doing so illegally, management may be in the clear

I'll end it on this.

Over so many years 5,300 employees were involved in this. We can be damn sure upper management knew about it and was culpable. No one can be that clueless and be an exec of 1 of the largest banks in world. And I am NOT just talking about the CEO, and the head of this dept. I'm sure there were plenty of execs under them who knew what was going on.

But as history has shown with what happened in 2008 and 2009. Nothing will happen, there will be fines, some apologies, but in the end it will be swept under the rug and fade away.
 
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