fake invoice

[srubin]

I received in my email a fake invoice from what appeared to be Go Daddy. It looked authentic and was for a website that I purchased through Go Daddy.

I paid the $53.00 by American Express thru Paypal. When I saw a Russian email address for the payment I asked Go Daddy about it and they said it was fake--and a very good one. I asked Paypal to refund the transaction and they said they could not. How does Paypal allow such users? This is clearly misuse of Paypal.

[drewtrace]

I received an invoice from Go Daddy the day before my domain name would have expired.... It was from paypal site and asked for confirmation ... also It said I would need to send the money in 24 hours or domain would be released. I said yes and 64 dollars was deducted from my bank account. The very next day I received an automatic renewal from GoDaddy for 18.00.

Contacted GoDaddy and they said they received the 18.00 but no other money.

I told them I believe they were hacked for someone to know I was using GoDaddy with paypal..

Paypal refuses to return my money.

[bpye4611]

This exact scenario happened to me except I canceled the two bogus invoices. 

[PayPal_Rich]

Thank you both for reaching out to the PayPal Community Forum for assistance. Fake and phishing emails are understandably alarming!

If you sent a "goods and services" email to a fake company by mistake, your best option would be to file an "item not received" claim. This would hold the payment on the recipient's side and then they would need to provide proof that they provided the product they claimed they were collecting payments for. 

Since they are pulling a scam, this would not be possible. Please keep in mind that PayPal is a large payment processor and an account can be created very quickly. However, a dispute like this would put a spotlight on the recipient's activities and likely result in their account being shut down. 

You can also forward their email to "spoof@paypal.com" to report their activities. 

[fintechb29]

Hi, how do we report the invoice directly to Paypal without downloading it and sending via email?

I mean, I want Paypal to be able to have the right link and if I download the pdf some of that info drops off. Seems really cumbersome if I have to put in the username that sent it, pdf, and link to how "I" access it in my Paypal account (which may not work for you).

Is there any "spam" button inside of Paypal for the invoices?

Scams like this seem like they must be under-reported since it is so difficult to report. The reports must be 1/10th of 1% whereas a spam button could raise that to 1% or 10% at least?

Without consideration for a reporting tool directly in Paypal on an invoice by invoice basis, I feel as if Paypal is too easily allowing fraud, or in another sense, passively encouraging fraud since Paypal makes fees on fraud.

So would like changes from Paypal please.

The GoDaddy solicitations from the Russian username I received seems like they would make $40 per transaction minimum. It is possible they *do* actually renew the domain. So sending it out to 1000s of emails addresses can net a very large extraction of funds from unsuspecting folks.

But the idea that it can be sent as an invoice without previously agreed upon services is fraud. It would have to say "This is not a bill" just like we receive from paper solicitations by mail in the USA. And while it may be difficult for Paypal to validate all of that, they should allow receivers to mark as spam so the fraudulent account can be placed on hold and reviewed, then obviously eliminated.

[SCSjoy]

I received two of these GoDaddy/Russian fake emails: one to my primary Paypal account and one to an email address that does not have a Paypal account.  I called in and spoke to someone who told me this was a known issue and do not open or click on any part of the email.  She had difficulty finding the invoice that was sent to the email address that didn't have a Paypal account, but eventually did find it.

It's now been a month, and the fake unpaid email is still sitting on my Dashboard, and it says it is an "outstanding bill" for $62.00.  When I called in today to ask why it is still on my Dashboard, the customer service agent told me I should click on the invoice and "cancel" it.  Now... correct me if I am wrong... but by clicking to cancel it, a message will be sent to the fraudster letting them know that they found someone who actually DOES have a Paypal account, and that will open up a whole other can of worms in terms of fraudulent activity that could potentially occur.

I was not happy with his insistence that I click to cancel the invoice, so I asked to speak with a supervisor.  When I reiterated the whole story to "Stephen", he agreed that I should NOT click to cancel the invoice, but he also said he could find no record of my conversation a month earlier.  He said he could send a ticket to have it investigated, but I could not be transferred to the fraud department, could not speak to anyone about the ticket, that they will not follow up with me, and that the unpaid fraudulent bill will NEVER be removed from my Dashboard unless I click to cancel it.

It sure seems to me that Paypal should take these "known issues" of fraud more seriously and do more to assist those of us who put our faith and confidence in their service and support.

[slaskey]

did you ever get this resolved?   i just today received the same email scam invoice  and paypal is TERRIBLE in customer service

[mikemng]

I got the same fraud invoice look like a charge for a domain I own in godaddy. As per advised by paypal I canceled the invoice, now they know it is a legit paypal account so I keep getting fake godaddy invoices for all of my domains. And I have many. I keep getting this fake invoices. And Paypal don't make it easy to report this obviously fake accounts. I don't get it. Paypal how can we trust your services when you can't even differentiate an obvious fake invoice and let alone give us an option to easily report it. It bears the suspicion as others mentioned that because Paypal only cares about its commision from fraud invoices. Paypal needs to take this seriously or I really cancel all my transactions from Paypal and block it from my email to avoid dealing with these spam invoices. 

[dwheeler99]

This happened to me and PayPal basically told me, "after careful review," to pound sand. That this could be carefully reviewed and still judged to be a legitimate transaction tells me all I need to know about PayPal's buyer protection. Protect yourself by not using PayPal. Thankfully, there are several other options now.

[gavrielidis6175]

Yup, just happened to me too. Same MO. Fake renewal invoice for an actual web domain I own, days ahead of the actual renewal date. PayPal closed my case almost as soon as I opened it and even after putting a stop payment order through my bank, they HONORED the transaction and negative'd my account. Unreal after I TOLD PayPal this was a scam.