Report: Wells Fargo issues date back 15 years

NEW YORK — Wells Fargo’s overly aggressive sales culture problems date back at least 15 years, and management largely ignored them until they spiraled out of control, resulting in millions of accounts being opened fraudulently, according to an investigation by the company’s board of directors.

The bank’s board also clawed back another $75 million in pay from two former executives, CEO John Stumpf and community bank executive Carrie Tolstedt, saying they dragged their feet on the issue for years.

The 110-page report has been in the works since September, when Wells Fargo acknowledged that its employees opened up to 2 million checking and credit card accounts without customers’ authorization. Trying to meet unnaturally high sales goals, Wells Fargo employees even created phony email addresses to sign up customers for online services.

Current and former employees have talked of intense and constant pressure from managers to sell and open accounts, and some said it pushed them into unethical behavior. Yesterday’s report backs up those employees’ stories.

“It was common to blame employees who violated Wells Fargo’s rules without analyzing what caused or motivated them to do so ... (or determine) whether there were responsible individuals, who while they might have not directed the specific misconduct, contributed to the environment (that caused it),” the board said.

The report said that problems in the bank’s sales culture date to at least 2002, far earlier than what the bank had previously said.