Coinbase locked my account while I watched my crypto drop 20%

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I am having an issue with Coinbase after it froze my account five months ago, leaving me unable to access £8,722. Every time I log in through the app, I get a message saying that my account is being reviewed and I can’t buy or sell any cryptocurrency until that is complete.
Just before my account was frozen, my investments were worth £10,955 so the value has fallen 20 per cent. I am aware that crypto goes up and down and that it’s a high-risk investment, but it’s really stressful to have no control over my account.
I have had my Coinbase account for about six years so I can’t understand why it has been frozen. I had planned to sell £6,000 at the end of March in light of the capital gains tax allowance falling from £6,000 to £3,000 in April. But I wasn’t able to move my money so I now face paying hundreds of pounds in tax.
Due to the large amount in my account and what I have lost so far, this is causing me a lot of stress. Each time I contact Coinbase I am just told to be patient.
Surely it’s not unreasonable to get the amount back that was in my account when it was frozen, along with some compensation for the stress this has caused me?Matthew, London
Cryptocurrency is notoriously volatile but it must have been painful to helplessly watch from the sidelines while the value of your investments held with Coinbase, which is an online platform for buying, selling and storing cryptocurrency, fell £2,233.
Coinbase wouldn’t tell me why it had decided to review your account or why it was taking so long. Back in March you sent all the information it had asked for, including payslips and bank statements. Your original payment to Coinbase had come from a National Savings & Investments savings bond and you gave evidence of that too.
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You told me that you earn £50,000 as a bus driver and that there was no reason for anyone to think you were committing any kind of financial crime.
When I got involved, it took two days for Coinbase to finish reviewing your account and you are finally able to buy and sell your investments. I asked why it had taken five months and a call from me for it to finish the review. It said: “The team have apologised to the customer for the delay and told him that we are working on improving our processes to ensure that we are providing timely support, especially with restricted accounts. We apologise that it wasn’t possible on this occasion.”
I asked if it would compensate you for the length of time it took to resolve this, but it wouldn’t. Hopefully your investments will recover, but now that the tax threshold is lower, it might be wise to consider spreading your withdrawals over several tax years to avoid a capital gains tax bill.
In January 2022 I used the travel agent Flight Centre to book flights for me, my friend and my two children to go on a once-in-a-lifetime trip to Belize. I paid £3,670 for the tickets, departing in December that year.
A few days later I found out that I might need to care for my elderly mother because her primary carer was going home to Poland for Christmas. My mum has Alzheimer’s and mobility problems so I felt it would be best if I was around to support her.
I emailed Flight Centre to ask about moving the dates to the following December — at this point I just wanted to know if it was possible to reschedule and whether there were any fees. The agent said it wasn’t possible to book that far in advance, but said our £3,670 would be kept as credit and there would be no fees for rescheduling, just the difference in fares and taxes. So we decided to postpone our trip.
I then contacted Flight Centre in February last year to book our tickets, but I didn’t hear back. Over the next few months I chased repeatedly and sent a complaint. This was frustrating because we couldn’t book our accommodation and tours until the flights were confirmed.
It wasn’t until August last year that I got an email saying I would need to pay an extra £2,720 to book the flights, which included a fuel surcharge and change fee. I was shocked and said I had been told that there were no fees associated with deferring the flights. I also pointed out that the flights would have been cheaper if they had been booked in February when I’d asked, but it would only book the flights if I paid the extra money.
As I didn’t want to lose my original payment, I felt I had no option but to pay. This has caused a great deal of stress and taken up huge amounts of my time and I am still paying off the debt. If I had been told in 2022 that I would need to pay thousands of pounds to change the flights, I would have stuck to our original plan and made other arrangements for my mother’s care.Michelle, Hampshire
The price of flights can fluctuate wildly but paying an extra £2,720 on top of the original fare did seem steep.
You had been reassured that there wouldn’t be a fee to reschedule. But in the time between cancelling and rebooking your tickets, the flexible cancellation policy adopted by British Airways — the airline your tickets were booked with — had ended. Yet you had based your decision to cancel on the policy at that time so I felt that should be honoured. British Airways didn’t want to comment because it said your contract was with the travel agent.
It was only when I got involved that we discovered that your original payment hadn’t been kept as credit after all. Flight Centre told me that your money had been paid to British Airways and that you weren’t entitled to get this back because you had bought a non-refundable ticket.
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This contradicted the email exchange with the agent who had reassured you that your payment could be used as credit. Flight Centre said that the rapidly changing Covid policies meant that its agent mistakenly said that your tickets were refundable. It said: “We would like to sincerely apologise to our customer and her travel companions for this error on our part.” But despite accepting its mistake, it wouldn’t refund you.
Flight Centre told me that it had contributed £2,502 to the cost of your new tickets as a goodwill gesture to account for the six-month delay in booking your new flights, during which time the price had increased. But you said Flight Centre hadn’t mentioned anything about contributing towards your new tickets — something didn’t add up.
This also didn’t change the fact that if you had been warned in the first place that your original payment would be lost then you wouldn’t have rescheduled your trip. After some back and forth, Flight Centre eventually agreed to refund the £2,720 payment, which is now in your bank account.
£1,456,493: the amount Troubleshooter has saved readers so far this year
If you have a money problem that you would like Katherine Denham to investigate email [email protected]. Please include a phone number