Shaw Academy Refusing to Pay Refund for a toolkit purchased by mistake

[behradh]

Hi everyone, I have a trial account with Shaw Academy and as I was browsing the website I was greeted with a pop-up, there was one button on this pop-up labeled 'ok' and in order to disregard the pop I clicked on it. Turns out that's a one-click purchase for their toolkit and now both Shaw Academy and PayPal are refusing my claims to a refund. I have already canceled all my pre-approved payments with PayPal and if this issue doesn't get resolved I will close my PayPal account as it makes it too easy for shady websites to abuse the one-click pre-approved payments. Is there a way for me to get a refund on this purchase?

[kernowlass]

@behradh 

So its paypals fault that you did that is it 🤔

Paypal covers you for non receipt of item OR item received but not as described.

It sadly does not cover you for buyer remorse and doesn't provide pop ups to tell you not to click ok to purchase something.

If you had the subscription with your bank instead, would you close your bank account as they wouldn't pay you back either !!

[behradh]

@kernowlass 

Shaw Academy is abusing the system to present you with pop-ups with no indication that they are a purchase. I would also answer the same way if they were a company with good customer support like Amazon who cover accidental purchases. The problem is PayPal gives this companies unlimited access to your account with no confirmation whatsoever of a purchase and no guarantee of covering accidental purchases. No matter how tech savvy you are accidents happen. What seperates a legit business and a shady one is in their terms of use and Shaw Academy is in no way shape or form a legitimate business and PayPal should not give unlimited access to your funds when all you do is sign up for a free trial. Just in this forum there are hundreds of messages related to Shaw Academy.

And mind you I'm not alone in this, I looked in other forums and reviews and twitter and their accounts and reviews are filled with the same problems and PayPal still treats them as a legitimate business with no assistance to users who are victims of these practices, so yes I do also hold PayPal accountable here.

[behradh · Accepted solution]

UPDATE: I got the refund successfully and for the people finding this thread in the same situation as me. I basically took it to social media, Facebook and specially twitter. I persisted and at the same time went back and forth with PayPal per email as the resolution center is basically useless for scamming websites like this. They are trapping you with purchases which are technically legal so there's not much that can be accomplished there. Someone on twitter also told me you can file a complaint at Better Business Bureau and that worked for them. I did not personally tried. Also the best option that works for everyone is block the money from leaving your account even if it is going to PayPal. That's the single best leverage you can have in this situation. You should be vigilant and as soon as you see the transaction show up you should call the bank and explain the situation to them and they will help you.

Tl;dr: Persist, send emails to PayPal after your resolution case is closed. Take it to social media and publicly shame Shaw Academy, report their pages and file complaints at sites like Better Business Bureau and fraud control. 

[TanyaLeila]

@behradh Thank you so much for your post. It gives me hope to return my money back. I had 100% the same situation with Shaw academy. The only problem is my English is far from perfect and I am afraid it will be not enough to complete the complain in BBB. Please may I ask your help or recommendations? I don't know if we can share personal data here for communication? <Removed>

[Keti2482]

hello. i recieved refund check from them and on my paypal there is sign that says that money was refunded but money did not show up on my credit card. so do i have to wait and it needs time ? 

[VASam]

I agree with you. PayPal offered me no protection. I lost over 100 dollars to Shaw Academy. Over 40 dollar for a tool.kit I didn't need...that was a surprised one-click pop-up and then they charged me 69 dollars for a subscription I cancelled prior to the free trial ending. To date they have not cancelled my free trial as it is still saying 'pending' and I have been disputing this for weeks with PayPal and they keep closing my case. PayPal is a part of the problem

[ChristinaL24]

In an attempt to rebut your rather ignorant & arrogant response...

I am currently dealing with a very similar situation with this company & PayPal.

I signed up for a "Free 4 Week Trial". Then, the very same day that I activated my account, I was charged $39.98 twice. 

This has nothing to do with "buyers' remorse", this is about fraudulent charges incurred through the deceptiveness of a company that is being allowed to repeatedly defraud consumers. I have been unemployed since June & I would never have knowingly paid nearly $80 for a random online course because put frankly I simply cannot afford it. Like, it literally took food off my table. There is no indication that you will be charged by clicking whatever link "authorizes" the charge & in fact, I only discovered that I had been charged when I received the invoice emails.

I immediately tried to cancel my account, but after being redirected through 7 different cancelation request pages, they stated that the account could not be canceled without calling them. I tried several times but could not get through. I then sent a direct request it was 2 days before I received a response refusing my refund requests.

In the meantime, I did some research and discovered that the Better Business Bureau & Trustpilot both have Shaw Academy red-flagged & I believe they are under investigation because there have been so many fraud complaints made against them. 

This is why I ended up filing a claim through PayPal. I have always used PayPal under the impression that the platform's intention is to provide a secure means for online transactions and protection to their users against scams like this. So it's very disappointing that they are facilitating this corrupt (and I feel criminal) association. But perhaps I've been mistaken all these years. As I have never had to deal with a situation like this, I am far from an expert.

My initial claim was unfortunately denied but I will be filing an appeal. Should that not go in my favor I will then contact my bank and, as a matter of fact, I am sure that they will issue the refunds based on the evidence I've gathered. It is not PayPal's fault that this company is committing these acts of fraud but when they choose to continue to facilitate those fraudulent actions they become complicit and liable. 

It will actually be a huge inconvenience to me to have to close my account but if I had a client who made me $10mil a year steal from a client who only made me $10k. I would drop the thief without a second thought. It's about ethical business principles. Plain and simple. 

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