Couple said Cash App held up their money for their baby's funeral until WBZ's Call for Action got involved
BOSTON - A young couple said a banking app held up their money and they weren't able to hold a proper funeral for their child.
With his chubby cheeks and fighting spirit, Bryson Alexander Flynn came into the world on April 26, 2023. His parents Jonathan and Veronica say he was their angel. Happy and healthy, it was a shock to both of them when Bryson died less than seven weeks later of sudden infant death syndrome.
Heartbroken, his young parents set up a GoFundMe to help pay for the funeral.
"The money that we had set up in the GoFundMe was how we were able to give our son something that no parent should ever have to experience," Bryson's father Jonathan told WBZ-TV.
Jonathan says he set up the GoFundMe to make a direct deposit into an online banking app account. From there, when he needed the money, he would transfer funds into Cash App, another online banking app that is used to send and get money. Both platforms are not actually banks at all.
Jonathan says he deposited $2,500 into that account in June. Within a couple of days, he noticed that Cash App sent him a notice saying there was a charge back on his account which he did not initiate. That meant that the $2,500 deposit was taken out of his account and was not part of his balance.
For six months the couple tried to find out where the money went. Jonathan says he kept asking Cash App where the money was and if there was no error, to return it.
"I was devastated when he told me it happened," said Veronica, Bryson's mother. "Especially because it delayed us being able to do any like services, or really celebrate his life. It was a very, very big hit to us."
Cash App is listed as the number two top free financial app on Google. It has nearly three million reviews and a 4.6 customer rating.
WBZ's I-Team obtained data from the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau that shows from 2021 to 2024, the agency received 3,468 complaints about Cash App. There were 1,571 complaints that involved money transfers and 419 had to do with unauthorized transactions or problems.
Carla Sanchez Adams from the National Consumer Law Center says platforms like Cash App, "are essentially a financial services company."
"There are no in-person places that you can talk to somebody, so you may not get the best answers to your questions. You may get the runaround we hear that a lot," she told WBZ.
Jonathan got tired of the runaround and contacted the I-Team's Call For Action. After we got involved, Cash App told him the deposit was held up for an unauthorized transaction dispute which he says he never made. Cash App then agreed to return his $2,500.
"I'm so thankful, I honestly, I kind of convinced myself that it was just never going to be returned after all the push back from them," Jonathan said. "Without you guys I truly don't believe I would have ever gotten the money back. Thank you again Cheryl."
The I-Team asked Cash App what went wrong in Jonathan's case. The company cited privacy reasons and said it does not comment on individual customer accounts.
If you have a consumer problem, email us at wbzcallforaction@cbs.com.
