If you’re having problems with your Coinbase account, you’re not alone. Coinbase has had almost 3,000 complaints with the Better Business Bureau in the last three years from consumers, according to the BBB website. And more than 1,000 customers of Coinbase made complaints to a federal agency, the Consumer Finance Protection Bureau.
These complaints by Coinbase users range from frozen accounts, to not being able to transfer or withdraw money, to their accounts being hacked, to fraudulent transfers of money. Some customers are claiming they can’t get basic responses from Coinbase’s customer service.
Our law firm routinely represents people who’ve had trouble with financial institutions, and we’ve handled (and won) a number of cases involving similar problems. We’ve seen many big companies outsource their customer service first to other countries, and more recently to Artificial Intelligence. That’s created lots of problems – in some cases, customers can’t even get a real person on the phone.
Can I file a lawsuit against Coinbase in court?
It may depend on your state law. Coinbase has an arbitration agreement with its customers. It selects California law for those arbitrations. Whether that’s a binding, legally enforceable agreement is up for debate. But even if it is, we’ve won many large awards in arbitration. An arbitration is like a mini-lawsuit – instead of a judge, a neutral lawyer is appointed to decide the case. It works kind of like a lawsuit, with a lot of the same rules. But it usually goes quicker, and in many cases the arbitrators are actually former judges who’ve retired.
We’ve had a lot of cases against financial institutions with big awards in arbitration. We’ve seen people lose access to their entire life savings when a bank improperly froze their account or let a scammer take money out of it. And the damage that causes to someone’s life can be tremendous. We can’t promise you that you’ll win, but we fight hard for our clients.
What do you charge for a lawsuit?
We work on a contingent fee basis, which means we take a portion of what we win, but only if we win. We normally don’t charge anything up front for cases like these with the “little guy” as a client. We do this because we take cases we think have a good chance of winning. We can’t promise we’ll win, because it doesn’t always happen. But we fight hard for our clients because we believe in them and in their cases.
We always try to sue under what are called “fee-shifting” statutes, which means a law that lets a consumer win their attorney’s fees if they win their case. Consumers are often protected by these kinds of laws even if they don’t know it. They’re designed to put the “little guy” on the same footing as the big giant corporation. Otherwise, they could afford lawyers and you never could.
Can I sue if Coinbase has frozen my account?
You may have a claim, depending on exactly what happened to you. We’re happy to review your claim. We’ve won or settled cases involving bank freezes before – it’s your money, and at some point you deserve to get it back. For example, we’ve seen some banks just hold onto frozen funds forever with no explanation. If the customer was doing something illegal involving the money, that’s one thing. That does happen sometimes. But if they weren’t, and there’s no good reason for the freeze, we think you have the right to get your money back.
Can I sue if my Coinbase account was hacked?
You might have a claim here too if Coinbase was negligent, or if you disputed the unauthorized transactions timely and Coinbase didn’t properly investigate. We see a lot of other companies do the bare minimum to investigate those kind of disputes, often violating federal law. It’s unfortunately common among big financial institutions. You do have rights, and we’re happy to take a look and see if we can help.
Can I sue if Coinbase locks me out of my account and won’t let me back in?
Some of the complaints to the Better Business Bureau about Coinbase involve allegations that customers were locked out of their accounts and weren’t ever allowed access again, despite submitting various forms of identification and proof of their own identity. If something like that happened to you, again, it’s your money – at some point you have a legal right to get it back.
What if Coinbase won’t let me withdraw money from my account?
Some of the Better Business Bureau complaints involve people who allege that they have been trying to withdraw money from their Coinbase account, but the company won’t make the transfers they initiated. This is an issue covered by federal law, and we routinely sue other financial institutions when something like this happens. It’s unfortunately another thing that’s common across various big financial companies, not just in cryptocurrency.
What if I have a problem that isn’t listed here?
We’re happy to consider your case anyway – you may have an unusual situation, or just one we haven’t heard of yet. Everyone’s case is different – most of what makes a good legal case is whether or not you were treated fairly, and if you suffered harm that you shouldn’t have. If a company treated you badly, we’ll try to find a law to help you.
Coinbase’s user agreement says they want California law to apply, and California has very strong laws protecting consumers from any kind of unfair conduct. And usually people don’t just run to the lawyers right away – most people only come to us when they’ve gotten so frustrated trying to get a company to treat them right that there’s nothing else to do. What’s unfair is up to the judge or the arbitrator, but if you think you’re being treated really badly, usually other people will, too.
How do I contact you?
Fill out the black form below, and it’ll take you to a survey where you can give us some basic information about your case. One of our team members will contact you for more information.