Wrong Paypal Address

[tkr18]

Seller and I agreed on a purchase price for a couple of bats. Upon request, Seller provided me with his Paypal details. I added the extra fees to purchase as Goods and get Buyer Protection, sent the payment and asked Seller to confirm receipt. He confirmed not receiving the funds and confirms that he provided the wrong address for Paypal payment.

I immediately went to Paypal for Buyer Protection rights and hoped to cancel the transaction. Because the address was an active and proper account the funds were properly received and the transaction could not be cancelled. Paypal then suggested that I contact the account holder via the e-mail address linked to the account and ask for a refund due to the inadvertent or accidental payment of funds to his account.The person I spoke to on the Paypal CS line did not leave me with any level of confidence that I would be successful in recovering the money in a Paypal dispute.

I have not yet heard anything back from the Paypal account holder and suspect that this will escalate to a Paypal dispute. Further, I suspect that I will need to get my credit card company involved.

To this point, the Seller has been supportive and willing to contact the account holder via e-mail to explain the matter. Does he bear any responsibility? Or should I be suspicious that I have just been scammed?

 

[chile]

i guess i would look into past deals to see if there's a pattern...hope you get this sorted soon.

 

[bird25]

i guess i would look into past deals to see if there's a pattern...hope you get this sorted soon.

This... you would win a dispute sinc3 nothing was ever shipped. Hopefully the person who you sent the money to checks their emails or balance soon

Best of luck getting this resolved quickly

 

[Jusrah99]

Hope this get resolved quickly...

It's the seller's fault...how do you give the wrong paypal address?

You should get your money back easily, but it's gonna be a while

 

[Dougiefresh91]

Tim that's ****ty to hear man. hope it gets resolved pretty quick. I am however a bit suspicious how you can give the wrong PayPal address? but that's my two cents.

 

[bird25]

Tim that's ****ty to hear man. hope it gets resolved pretty quick. I am however a bit suspicious how you can give the wrong PayPal address? but that's my two cents.

I wonder if it was off by a digit or WAY off. Could have just been a typing error on the phone

If it was a scam, it would just amount to a loan since he paid as goods and never received them. Glad he didn’t do friends and family, might have been lost forever.

 

[Dougiefresh91]

I wonder if it was off by a digit or WAY off. Could have just been a typing error on the phone

If it was a scam, it would just amount to a loan since he paid as goods and never received them. Glad he didn’t do friends and family, might have been lost forever.

I guess the digit stuff could be correct I would be intrigued to know. but Tim won't divulge those juicy details haha. but I hope it works out Tim

 

[tkr18]

As this has evolved, the paypal address I was given was missing a few letters and, from the efforts of the Seller, certainly seems accidental. It seems that it might be incredibly unlucky that the mistake turned out to be an actual address with a paypal account.

The Seller is really stepping up and helping by contacting Paypal and the person who got the funds and has even gone the next step to offer to send me the bats whether or not he receives payment stating that it was his mistake.

I guess that two lessons that can be learned here are:1) buyers should always protect themselves by paying the few extra bucks to send payment as Goods instead of F&F and 2) depending upon the amount of the purchase (and this one's digits were in the 1/2K USD range) it might be wise to send a small down payment first to confirm /verify address and then send balance

I will post here to let you know how this works out

 

[Joker]

i've made a typo giving my email address for paypal before. **** happens sometimes

Hope this get resolved quickly...

It's the seller's fault...how do you give the wrong paypal address?

You should get your money back easily, but it's gonna be a while

Tim that's ****ty to hear man. hope it gets resolved pretty quick. I am however a bit suspicious how you can give the wrong PayPal address? but that's my two cents.

 

[Jusrah99]

i've made a typo giving my email address for paypal before. **** happens sometimes

I stand corrected sir...you're right...i guess i was rage postin for Tim...but now that all the info is out it sounds like an honest mistake...

 

[tkr18]

I give the Seller a lot of credit. He acknowledged his mistake and is really helping out. He missed 3 letters in the Paypal address....incredibly unlucky that it still fed an active Paypal account

Buyers out there should always protect themselves. A few bucks is always worth it. I know that going forward I will always do it and will always use a small payment to verify a PayPal account when it is someone new I am working with, a $5 investment is a no-brainer.

 

[blackbeasst]

Wtf was the first part of his email address to screw up 3 characters and it still go to an active email?

 

[johnny fitz]

Sadly had this happen myself. Phone auto corrected on other guy. He didn't catch it. Sent right away and contacted useless PayPal... luckily the guy it got sent to refunded on his own.

 

[tkr18]

Not getting any responses, either via e-mail or through PayPal, from the guy who received the funds. Looks like I am going to have to go through the Dispute Resolution process.

The Seller missed 3 letters between the first and last initial changing a name followed by 3 numbers to initials followed by the 3 numbers: as an example, instead of providing something like joeyb123@yahoo he provided jb123@yahoo (this is just an example)

 

[fuzzy2651]

Ducking autocorrect

 

[tkr18]

At what point, if any, do I contact my credit card that is linked to my Paypal account and tell them that there is a dispute or do I simply have to wait for the snail paced Paypal Dispute resolution to work or not work?

 

[hitless45]

If this is going nowhere fast I think now is the time to contact your cc, possibly it will speed the process.

 

[Joker]

let paypal run it course

 

[bndawgs]

check your CC terms and conditions for dispute timelines, but maybe see what paypal does. I'm guessing they won't do anything.

 

[tkr18]

After several attempts to contact the person who received the payment, via e-mail and through PayPal, a PayPal dispute was officially filed on the 19th of October.

After the dispute was filed, the person finally e-mailed me and said he intended to file a counter-claim for all of the fees he would incur to resolve the claim. I have no idea what that means, but it has been 4 day since he sent that e-mail.

I would have thought it would have been a simple enough transaction to refund the money, but he intends to fight for fees. I have not heard anything from PayPal

Does anyone know what fees this guy could have incurred or fees from his end that may be in dispute? It sounds to me like he may have used or deposited the funds

 

[stork]

Possibly. Otherwise it would seem a simple refund transaction, but maybe there is a time frame limit?

 

[jbo911]

I don't think there would be any fees for refunding you but there might be for PayPal taking your money back. Either way he's clearly a **** who is going to fight for a Payday he didn't earn.

I would at least call my CC company and ask their opinion and see if they have a time limit on this type of thing.

 

[tkr18]

It seems strange to me when, I think, all he had to do is refund the money or cancel the transaction. I guess I don’t know because it never happened to me.

The only scenario I can think of is I paid as goods using my CC linked to PayPal and he received the sum minus the standard fees. He may have deposited or used the funds and then got the PayPal dispute communications and now has to fund the full amount and thinks I should be responsible for whatever fees there are because it was my fault. This is just a guess as I have heard nothing from PayPal confirming what is going on.

I do know that whatever timing issues there may be are a direct result of the PayPal process. I have followed their guidelines from the start. I will be contacting the CC to get their input.

 

[Joker]

Call PayPal

 

[bndawgs]

if you sent the money as Goods, then he was hit with fees when he got the money. if he clicks on refund payment and then enters the original amount, he has to cover the paypal fees. paypal still collects their fees.

so unless you want to let him refund the net amount, you'll need to get paypal or your CC involved.

 

[mcm21078]

any time i've done a refund on paypal (via ebay), the fees are factored in. No one loses any money on fees during the whole process. Maybe Ebay is different though I'm not sure.

 

[bndawgs]

hmm, the other guy might have to call Paypal after doing refund.

https://www.paypal-community.com/t5...-when-it-was-their-mistake/m-p/1025974#M44537

 

[tkr18]

PayPal was “unable to decide this claim in my favor at this time”.

I called and after a half hour or so of being on hold, spoke to a representative. She said that the claim was not considered officially closed because the person who received the funds was now raising a dispute based upon fees. It may mean that I will have to work out a settlement type of resolution. She mentioned that his account is held outside of the US and that additional currency conversion fees are now part of the dispute. She also suggested that I contact my credit card and include the claim number that PayPal has provided on the dispute. She said that PayPal has already provided notifications to my credit card because it is a non-US transaction.

Hopefully my credit card company will assist. I have provided the original seller with this information but have heard nothing back as of yet.

This has gotten crazy and frustrating. Thank goodness the amount is relatively minor (less than $1K). Even if I totally lose, it’s not overly threatening from a financial standpoint.

It has provided me with some insight on future deals. I hate to be the squeaky wheel, but unless you absolutely know who you dealing with, take whatever precautions you can to protect your interests. I have detailed a few above and to it I am going to add that I will no longer ask for payment as a gift/friends & family. My prices will always include regular PayPal payment and I will always include fees in what I pay.

 

[hitless45]

Well that bites.. Hope your cc company can help out in someway..

 

[tkr18]

FINAL RESOLUTION:
My credit card company stepped up for me and issued a refund. I got back close to 95% of the payment. The rest covered PayPal and currency conversion fees. I was told that the fees were paid to PayPal and a financial institution and that neither the account holder who got the payment nor the Seller received any funds

I have not heard from the Seller since I told him the Security and Fraud Division of my credit card was managing the claim and I provided them all of the e-mail and PayPal account information I was given by the Seller.

I honestly do not know if this was a scam, but it should be used as a fair warning when dealing, especially when you are doing it with someone you don’t know. A few extra bucks to pay by goods using a verified credit card on your end is really money well spent. I know others have different opinions or reasons for not paying additional fees and they are entitled to them. I simply state that if it is within your ability to do it that way, please do all you can to protect yourself

Take care and best wishes to you and yours especially for a happy and safe holiday season