Account hacked, fraudulent charges, PayPal won't help me at all
- Mark as New
- Bookmark
- Subscribe
- Mute
- Subscribe to RSS Feed
- Permalink
- Report Inappropriate Content
Someone hacked/stole my information and completed four Instacart transactions in a row. My Instacart is connected to PayPal, so that's how they paid for it. I immediately contacted my bank, Paypal, and Instacart. Instacart sent an email saying yes, they were fraudulent charges. My bank blocked the charges, but Paypal is STILL saying I still owe them money. I called and customer service was useless. They recommended I just pay it. I'm not giving Paypal money that was stolen from me!!! I also filed a fraud claim, and Paypal denied and closed it with no communication whatsoever. What is the next step? File with the BBB? Hope someone can help because this is ridiculous. Thank you.
- Labels:
-
Disputes & Chargebacks

- Mark as New
- Bookmark
- Subscribe
- Mute
- Subscribe to RSS Feed
- Permalink
- Report Inappropriate Content
Hello @jkwilso3
Welcome to the PayPal Help Community and thanks for posting here!
I completely understand your concern about the outcome of the unauthorized claim. When a payment is initiated through PayPal and paid by bank, a payment to the seller completes instantly because we fund this on customer's behalf and wait for a bank transaction to clear. If your bank declines your transfer and the PayPal is unable to get the funds from your bank/back up funding source, it will be added to your balance which makes it negative. It's possible that the case got automatically closed as the charge is a part of subscriptions and you can contact the Instacart support team to refund the payments. If this is not the case, You can request an appeal by contacting Customer Support.
Good luck and have a great day!
Bindu
- Mark as New
- Bookmark
- Subscribe
- Mute
- Subscribe to RSS Feed
- Permalink
- Report Inappropriate Content

- Mark as New
- Bookmark
- Subscribe
- Mute
- Subscribe to RSS Feed
- Permalink
- Report Inappropriate Content
Hello @Fibielectro,
Welcome to PayPal's Community Forum. I'm sorry to hear about your recent experience with PayPal's dispute process. Whenever you notice unrecognized activity on your PayPal account, you may want to check your Automatic Payments for any billing agreements or subscriptions for that merchant. If the appeal on your case does not come back in your favor, and the transaction was paid with a debit card, credit card, or bank, you may also want to reach out to your funding source to see what options are available.
Best wishes with this and future transactions through PayPal,
- Jon K
If you find this or any other post was helpful, make our community better by giving kudos or accepting it as a solution.
- Mark as New
- Bookmark
- Subscribe
- Mute
- Subscribe to RSS Feed
- Permalink
- Report Inappropriate Content
The “funding source” is a CITI bank account that was added by the hacker, not mine, and is still showing in the wallet. Pay Pal has the ability to locate the owner of that account, I do not. As reported to Pay Pal on Dec 25th, Jan 8th and Jan 22nd, my account was accessed on Dec 22nd, a CITI bank account was added (not mine), and my personal account was upgraded to a business account (without my authorization). Funds were transferred in by a name Epiphany [removed] (I do not know this person or company), then transferred out to the same CITI bank account that is not mine. On Dec 25th, four separate deposits were made by a different person who I do not know, on Dec 26th (after I reported the suspicious activity) the hacker attempted to transfer those funds to the CITI bank account (not mine). I then received a claim result notice from Pay Pal that the activity is consistent with my use and no unauthorized activity occurred, no further information was provided by pay pal. I phoned Pay Pal, because there is no option for responding to the email, and without my asking for this, the rep said that I had to wait for the other institution to conduct their review and that he would personally monitor the cases and provide me with updates. I did not receive any updates from this rep, and received another system generated email indicating that pay pal reviewed my case and determined no unauthorized activity occurred. I phoned back and asked for a supervisor this time, she was very rude and did not care and said there is nothing she can do except appeal it again. Which she says she was putting through. I received another system generated email an hour later stating that the activity is consistent with my use and no unauthorized activity occurred. As a personal account holder since 2013, with only a credit card attached, how is an upgrade to a business account, adding a bank account, selling fake items and receiving payments then transferring cash consistent with a decade of personal user transactions only. Pay Pal has failed to uphold the user assurances marketed to customers, and has failed to provide evidence of a business agreement that I supposedly agreed to enter into. I followed the instructions to report the unauthorized activity, was told different things by the customer service reps the first two times I phoned, Pay Pal customer service is atrocious and the resolution centre is simply lip service while hiding behind system generated processes with zero accountability for security.
- Mark as New
- Bookmark
- Subscribe
- Mute
- Subscribe to RSS Feed
- Permalink
- Report Inappropriate Content
- Mark as New
- Bookmark
- Subscribe
- Mute
- Subscribe to RSS Feed
- Permalink
- Report Inappropriate Content
- Mark as New
- Bookmark
- Subscribe
- Mute
- Subscribe to RSS Feed
- Permalink
- Report Inappropriate Content
- Mark as New
- Bookmark
- Subscribe
- Mute
- Subscribe to RSS Feed
- Permalink
- Report Inappropriate Content

Haven't Found your Answer?
It happens. Hit the "Login to Ask the community" button to create a question for the PayPal community.
- Can a merchant charge my account with just an email from me agreeing to the charge? in Transactions
- Charge on bank account but no transaction matching in PayPal in Transactions
- When are fees charged on credit card or bank account retrievals? in Transactions
- Hacked technical support? in Security and Fraud
- Occasional payment via credit card in the USA? in Transactions