Bank of America has again been accused of mishandling homeowners’ requests for mortgage modifications, but this time, the claims have come from former bank employees.

At least half a dozen ex-BofA workers have filed statements in a Boston lawsuit against the bank saying they regularly lied to homeowners seeking assistance with their loans and denied applications for phony reasons—and that they were rewarded for sending homeowners to foreclosure.

In many cases, BofA rejected mortgage modifications en masse—in what bank officials called a “blitz”—that resulted in hundreds of requests being tossed at one time for no real reason.

Explanations that were subsequently provided for the rejections were simply made up, according to William Wilson, Jr., who worked as a BofA underwriter and manager from 2010 until 2012.

Another former employee, Simone Gordon, who worked at the bank from 2007 until early 2012 as a senior collector, told ProPublica that she and other workers “were told to lie to customers and claim that Bank of America had not received documents it had requested.”

“We were told that admitting that the Bank received documents ‘would open a can of worms,’” she added. Bank employees “who placed ten or more accounts into foreclosure in a given month received a $500 bonus.”

A BofA spokesman dismissed the accusations, saying in a statement that each of the former employees’ statements was “rife with factual inaccuracies” and that the bank will respond more fully in court next month.

Similar allegations were leveled at BofA three years ago in Arizona and Nevada, where lawsuits claimed the bank mishandled modification applications.

-Noel Brinkerhoff

To Learn More:

Bank of America Lied to Homeowners and Rewarded Foreclosures, Former Employees Say (by Paul Kiel, ProPublica)

Bank of America has Worst Big Bank Home Loan Customer Service Complaint Record (by Matt Bewig, AllGov)

U.S. Finally Sues Bank of America for Mortgage Fraud (by Noel Brinkerhoff and David Wallechinsky, AllGov)

Bank of America Smacked with Foreclosure Fraud Lawsuits (by Matt Bewig, AllGov)