Can't Confirm Secondary Email

VG_JHeadrick
Contributor
Contributor

Hey guys. So - I'm having a bit of a problem here.

 

TL;DR Version:

  • Want to add a secondary email to my account.
  • Try to confirm secondary email - get "We're having some trouble completing your request. Please try again shortly." error.
  • Change password and check if email is already in use - it's not.
  • Change notifications to HTML - no change.
  • Try confirming multiple times - no change.
  • Turn off various blockers in Firefox - no change.
  • Contacted PayPal Support on Twitter, but no response, yet.
  • Have not tried another browser.
  • Payments waiting to be claimed and can't be until email is confirmed.
  • UPDATE: Tried on Chrome and even Edge - same result.

 

I've had my PayPal account for a long time now, more than 9 years at least, but one thing I've never done is add a secondary email address. Never needed it, really.

 

However, since I've started doing other things that don't relate to graphic design, I decided that I should use the email address that I have for those things (I have one email for design work, and one for my game review site/gaming YouTube channel)

 

So - I added the second email address to my account. When I did, I got the confirmation email. It came through just fine. I hit the "Confirm This Email" button in the message, type in my password and...

 

"We're having some trouble completing your request. Please try again shortly."

 

I thought maybe I typed my password wrong, or that I already had a PayPal account with that email and forgot about it, so I hit the button to change my password. Got it changed, went to sign in and...it signs me into my normal account. So now I know it wasn't already in use.

 

I've since tried confirming this email address 20 or more times, signing in with the new password, and I just keep getting the same error.

 

"We're having some trouble completing your request. Please try again shortly."

 

Now, I do currently have 2 payments waiting to be claimed by that email, but I don't know if that would actually cause problems.

 

I tried switching my emails received to HTML and resending the confirmation email - still get the same problem. I turned off my ad blocker and Disconnect plugin. I've even disabled Firefox's built in tracking protection.

 

No change. Just the error.

jihRydL.png

 

 

What can I do, if anything, to get this fixed? I've sent a message to @AskPayPal on Twitter, but haven't heard back just yet - probably because it's the weekend right after Thanksgiving.

 

Posting here to hopefully get a solution to the problem. Only thing I haven't tried yet is another browser entirely.

 

I'd like to get this cleared up as soon as possible as I have a couple of payments waiting to be claimed by the email, but they can't be until it's confirmed.

 

UPDATE: So, I've now tried on Chrome and Edge as well - still got the same result. "We're having some trouble completing your request. Please try again shortly."

Login to Me Too
1 ACCEPTED SOLUTION

Accepted Solutions
Solved

ellion
New Community Member

thanks! this was the solution ! i struggled for a week in blogs and trying to get help from the support team with no luck.

kudos!

View solution in original post

Login to Me Too
13 REPLIES 13

grncreek
New Community Member

Just curious if you have figured out how to resolve this?   I'm having the same exact issue.  I actually called paypal and the person I spoke with suggested opening a new paypal account with the email that won't verify.  But like you I've been a long time user (I think going on 20 years) and definitely don't want to hassle with two paypal accounts.

Login to Me Too

VG_JHeadrick
Contributor
Contributor

Sadly, no.

 

Talked to someone at support and their only solution was to create a new email and use that - which doesn't solve the problem, which was that there was a transaction in progress for the email I was trying to use and I didn't know that would prevent me confirming it.

 

Now the money's basically in limbo and there isn't much I can do to get it (The company it was coming from unfortunately has terrible customer service and hasn't responded to my e-mails. It was only $5, though, so not a big deal or anything - just annoying.)

Login to Me Too

VasVou
Member
Member
I don't know whether they resolve your case, but I have the same issue, unable to verify the secondary email with money pending (unfortunately).
Login to Me Too

pelted
New Community Member

So is the common variable here that the second emails we are trying to add have pending transactions so that's why we can't do this? This seems like a very serious oversight on PayPal's part as it seems this is a very likely scenario for why one would be adding another email address to their account. 

Login to Me Too

mjigwagu
Contributor
Contributor

I went through the exact same thing. Had this problem for months was super frustrating and upsetting so here is my suggestion,

I'm not completely certain that this will work for you but; after speaking to the security center at  (can't insert pay pal number) , the agent pointed out that the problem was due to a money request I forgot to cancel about a year ago. go to 'Activity' and go through all your transactions to make sure nothing is amiss. usually they don't state the problem clearly so just comb through. Hope this helps. 🙂 

Login to Me Too
Solved

ellion
New Community Member

thanks! this was the solution ! i struggled for a week in blogs and trying to get help from the support team with no luck.

kudos!

Login to Me Too

kexas1
Member
Member

can anyone actually write the solution ?? cause i actually just click to see the solution and i cant see any solution 😛 @ellion

Login to Me Too

Jemstarr4
Contributor
Contributor

I am having this exact problem. I created a new ebay account using my second email back up address.  Without thinking...my first ebay sale put the payment to my second email address. This created a second account ....I had to call and get PayPal to close that account.  There is $45 pending  to that email address.  They tried to confirm the email too but they could not and said I could just do it.  For two days I have tired with the same message " We're having some trouble completing your request. Please try again shortly."  I am beginning to think the common issue is the pending money in our second email address??  I've messaged for support ...awaiting answer.

Login to Me Too

nawnaw1
Member
Member

Hi guys, it's very frustrating. But I have solved this issue myself and myself only. No credits to no help articles and no paypal customer service. I've only been trying to confirm it on my computer browsers. 

So, i took the time to download paypal on my phone (iOS) and clicked on the confirmation email link > the gmail browser appears and i logged in. It just happened very smoothly as it should've on the computer browser. 

You can also try to login with your new secondary email in the paypal app itself. It also seem to work. Try different devices if one device don't work. It's probably an issue of cookies, caches and stuff. A fresh device without former paypal seems to do the trick. 

 

It worked for me personally, not sure if it will do for most of you. Good luck.

Login to Me Too

Haven't Found your Answer?

It happens. Hit the "Login to Ask the community" button to create a question for the PayPal community.