How to report illegal activities

[earthshoes]

I've now had this happen twice. A couple of weeks ago, someone with a paypal account attempted to charge over 800.00 to three of my credit cards. It did not come through my paypal account at all.  All the charges were declined. I went through and froze all the cards and replaced two of them. 

This happened again yesterday--a charge for over 700, claiming that it was PayPal for a Dyson. Again--it was declined because I'd frozen my card earlier in the day. 

I've reported it stolen and ordered a new one. 
 

If I report these accounts to Paypal will they do anything about it? 

[PayPal_JonK]

Hello @earthshoes, 

Welcome to the PayPal Community Forum. I'm sorry to hear you've experienced some unauthorized activity on your financials. I can certainly understand how concerning and down right scary these kind of situations can be. I've read your most recent post, and I certainly think reporting this with your card company is the right direction to go. If the activity had occurred on your PayPal account, we would recommend reporting the activity through our Resolution Center, wherein PayPal would lead the investigation. Since it sounds like it's not on a PayPal account you own, we would recommend following up with your card company on this. Once the proper teams on PayPal's side receive that report from your bank, PayPal's resolution teams will take the necessary action on the account responsible for the activity.

Performing a virus scan on your computer is certainly something we'd recommend as well - but it sounds like you've already done that from your other post. And since it sounds like something malicious may have been found, changing every password for every online account would absolutely be something we'd recommend. One tip I've found works very well here is trying to set a different password for each online account you have - even if it's a small variation - and not storing or saving those passwords online, in your browser settings, or on a notepad in your computer or phone.  I'd also recommend doing a weekly scan on your computers to see if anything new potentially shows up.

You may also wish to put a fraud alert on your credit record with one of the three major Credit Reporting Agencies (Equifax, Experian, TransUnion), just in case. Although each CRA is a separate entity, you only have to contact one of the CRAs and they will automatically notify the other two.

Best wishes on this and future activity through PayPal. You're welcome to reach out to one of our Support Teams if you have any questions regarding your account. 

Good luck!

 - Jon K

[earthshoes]

Hi Jon, and thank you for replying. I appreciate your sympathy. I guess you didn't see everything with my other post (it was really long so I understand). That charge hit my debit card this morning and this time it did come through Paypal. And it is a big mess. That's half my husband's paycheck (bad weather meant he missed work so it doesn't always look like that). I don't get paid for two more weeks. If we can't sort this out, we're going to be struggling. 

I am going to begin with my bank because I've been reading about other people lodging similar complaints with PayPal and because the merchant had supposed proof of confirmation, PayPal sided with them and the victim was without recourse.  I had this happen with me when I didn't receive an item I ordered. The merchant claimed they had a proof that they'd shipped out the item I'd ordered (an air fryer). It never arrived. In fact all the people who ordered it went to their page and complained that they'd received nothing. I ate the expense and never again ordered anything via Facebook. 

I am very likely done with PayPal after this. I don't feel protected at all anymore (I've had two strangers request large amounts of money from me in the last month. And I'm charged a ridiculous amount of money every time I send funds to family or friends). It is rapidly becoming easier to go it alone. That way if someone charges me fraudulently I can go straight to the credit card company or bank myself. 

[PayPal_JonK · Accepted solution]

@earthshoes, Thank you for the additional information and the clarification. I completely understand handling this through your card. If you've already started the process there, we would certainly recommend following through with them, as well. 

For the future, if you can see the transaction on your PayPal account, the option to report the activity should be there. Sorry for any confusion here. If it was through PayPal, but you don't see the transaction on your account, that's when it's best to handle it with your card or bank. 

In regard to the other transactions / similar complaints, I can say there are different protections for different situations. For example, if a merchant provides proof of delivery, but the dispute was unauthorized and we do indeed discover unauthorized activity in our investigation, that may be an instance where PayPal refunds the buyer out of their own pocket. If it was a case of an Item not Received or an Item received but not as Described, there may be different criteria we may request from both parties. If that air fryer was a recent transaction, please reach out to our Customer Support teams through Twitter DM or Facebook PM so they can review what options - if any - are available. We potentially may have just needed a letter from the shipping company stating it was not delivered to the address provided in the transaction details. Either way, I'm sorry to hear that transaction and that case didn't go as expected. 

If it helps, here's a pretty useful article to help you spot common scams and a link to our Purchase Protection details. Also, to help prevent those unexpected invoices / money requests, changing your email address on PayPal is pretty effective. 

In any instance, thank you for your time, and I hope we're able to assist in the future. Cheers,

 - Jon K