When you’re going through the often-tedious process of refinancing your mortgage, getting some bad information can only serve to make things worse. That’s why a West Virginia woman is suing Wells Fargo, alleging that the bank told her to stop making loan payments then put her into collections and foreclosure.

According to the complaint [PDF], filed in a federal court in West Virginia, the homeowner took out her loan through Wells Fargo Home Mortgage in 2006.

In early 2015, she contacted the company about modifying her loan. At that point, a rep for Wells Fargo Home Mortgage instructed her not to make payments while the modification was being processed.

Relying on the information from the rep, the woman stopped payment, while providing all necessary paperwork for the modification.

In June 2015, Wells Fargo re-sent the woman a packet requesting duplicate documents. The following month, the woman says she began receiving debt collection calls.

When the woman called Wells Fargo about the collection calls, she was told that her account was mistakenly removed from the modification program and placed in foreclosure.

The rep placed the loan back into the modification program, but the woman claims the mistake meant that Wells Fargo failed to credit her account for four months after being taken out of foreclosure.

Wells Fargo breached its duties by “allowing [the woman’s] indebtedness to accrue after instructing her to cease making regular payments under the loan and by representing that she need not worry about acceleration and foreclosure as [Wells Fargo] was considering her for a loan modification, thereby giving Plaintiff the false impression that shed need not take any measures to reinstate the loan,” the suit states.

In all, the woman seeks damages for the months her mortgage wasn’t credited and four other instances in which Wells Fargo allegedly illegally charged late fees to her account.

[via The West Virginia Record]

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