The U.S. Department of Justice and the Securities and Exchange Commission have expanded the scope of their investigation into Wells Fargo’s illegal sales practices to the bank’s wealth management unit.

According to a report by The Wall Street Journal, the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) is probing a few Phoenix area employees in this case.

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Earlier this month, the bank revealed an internal probe of its wealth arm in relation to the scandal.

The bank in a securities filing said it is evaluating “whether there have been inappropriate referrals or recommendations, including with respect to rollovers for 401(k) plan participants, certain alternative investments, or referrals of brokerage customers to the company’s investment and fiduciary services business”.

The independent probe into the wealth unit was in response to problems being flagged by whistleblowers in that area, which is separate from the latest investigation.

The independent review aimed to evaluate “whether there have been inappropriate referrals or recommendations, including with respect to rollovers for 401(k) plan participants, certain alternative investments, or referrals of brokerage customers to the company’s investment and fiduciary services business”.

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The issue stemmed from Wells Fargo’s involvement in illegal sales practice of secretly opening unauthorised deposit and credit card accounts.

The bank was fined $185m by the US regulators, after which the bank decided to remove all product sales goals in retail banking.