I have to admit it: I've been victim of scam, and I've been an idiot. However, I thought PayPal would protect me from scammers online.
I still believe PayPal offers a good layer of protection, but unfortunately it's not well prepared for the scam technique of which I am victim.
Here are the details.
I bought something online, and never received the package.
I opened a claim with PayPal, PayPal contacted the seller, and the seller provided a tracking number with FeDex. So far so good.
Now comes the trick: FeDex shows the package as delivered. Awesome! The problem? It wasn't delivered to me.
In particular, the package was delivered to the same city in which I live. Just not to me.
And now the problem: PayPal doesn't ask for proof of delivery to the actual address of the buyer. For PayPal, having a tracking number that shows as "delivered" in the city of the buyer is enough to "prove" that the buyer received the package. Too bad I live in a city with 117k other people.
And as you might have guessed already, PayPal closed the claim in favor of the seller.
I called PayPal's customer service, and they asked me for evidence from FeDex that the package hasn't been delivered to me.
FeDex doesn't have a service for that, FeDex customer service doesn't even have an email (what about people with speech disorders, btw?..)
Anyway, I called FeDex, I informed I was recording the call, and the representative stated very clearly that the address of the receiver of the package having the tracking number provided to me, is not me.
At this point PayPal should take action not only to change the resolution of the case in my favor, but also to start asking for full proof of delivery including the shipping address, for future claims of this sort. Otherwise, PayPal would make the interest of scammers.
FeDex provides an easy way to get this proof of delivery that includes the shipping address of both the sender and the receiver, but only the sender can obtain it. Which means, an honest sender would go on fedex.com and obtain this proof of delivery, while a criminal sender would not.
I hope PayPal can help. I am lucky enough in life, and my finance won't be affected too much by 500$ lost in this transaction, but many other people might struggle because of this scam technique. I really hope this can be helpful for the community, and I have faith that PayPal will do the interest of honest (even though at times naïve) people, and not of the scammers.
Call to FeDex: uploaded on youtube, but not going to share publicly for protection of my own privacy.
