In a moment of pre Christmas judgment lapsery, I bought an item of clothing as a spur of the moment gift for my other half directly from a Facebook ad, using Apple Pay. It occurred to me a few days ago that the item of clothing never appeared. It wasn’t expensive, but wasn’t pennies either. Looking back through my emails, I don’t seem to ever have had any contact from the company, and I’m now not even sure what the company was called. I e found the offending transaction on my online transactions via mobile banking, but the reference is meaningless gobbledegook. I suspect that I’m never going to see either the item of clothing or the cash again; but before I chalk it up to experience, does anyone have any ideas/suggestions about how to trace/chase/reverse this transaction? I’m presuming now it’s some sort of sneaky scam, which annoys me as I’m usually pretty good at avoiding them.
cheers all!
Looking back through my emails, I don’t seem to ever have had any contact from the company, and I’m now not even sure what the company was called.
Would your browser history go back that far?
Facebooks/Instagram are a bit of a hotbed for scam advertising precisely because the advert becomes untraceable - if you even know an advert is a scam and report it facebook's response isnt to remove the advert so that others don't fall for it, its just to hide it from you.
It can't hurt to at least enquire with your bank if they can reverse it. I've been in a similar situation but fortunately paid through PayPal so I both had an email confirmation and also PayPal refunded it
Phone your bank, tell them you don't recognize the charge.
tell them you don’t recognize the charge
But they do recognise the charge, they bought it!
I'd chalk it up to 'do better next time' personally, it's not your credit providers fault you bought some random crap on the internet, especially via facebook, lol!
I would report it anyway, even if not to get the money back, hopefully the funds recipient would receive some kind of black flag that might block their account from the payment system if others also report it.
Not that I have massive hope that financial institutions have such policies to protect consumers and make criminal activity harder, but you never know.
Phone your bank, tell them you don’t recognize the charge.
But that's fraud
I got done by one of these pre Christmas. FB advert for cheap garden storage box. I realised when I didnt get an email of confirmation - had the browser page still open and stupidly created an account to see my order (which actually was there). I try to never create accounts if possible. Anyway, of course item never showed up, but the damage was done when I created the account. I used a p/w that was similar to other online passwords. Weeks of accounts being hacked. Was a nightmare retrieving all. So if you have created an acc or put any password in, I hope it was completely different to any other.
You can dispute transactions in Apple Pay
I used a p/w that was similar to other online passwords.
You may or may not already know this, but there is software that you can install across your devices that will manage passwords for you so that you’re not reusing them.
On the Apple ecosystem this is built in. YMMV.
I got done by one of these pre Christmas. FB advert for cheap garden storage box.
I saw the same ads. And thought, really, that is far too cheap, FB ones were £26ish,looked online, around £150.
I was nearly caught out on Saturday night, FB again, ‘less then half price wellies’. The OH needs some wellies, these were again around £26, I even added them to the basket, but thought I’d look them up on the web - ‘Muck Boot Company’ Prices of £80+ on their own website, so of course the FB one was a fake, but all the details were the same, just far cheaper, and payment would go to the scammer.Of course, on the phone, you cannot see the web address you are at while browsing.
I had a £130 non-received from an online seller in December, no contact from Seller to emails etc, contacted my bank, was refunded after around 3 weeks. The Seller looked legit (car tyre seller in Birmingham). Try your bank, they deal with 100’s of these every day.
thsnls for the insights everyone. I think I’ll call my bank today, fully expecting to chalk the loss up to experience, but you never know.
from a Facebook ad
I automatically assume that everything advertised on Facebook is a scam of some kind (either nothing turns up or you get the nasty Temu clone of whatever they advertised).
Don't think you'll get anything from Facebook - it's not in their interest. Even the forms to report dodgy ads are broken, and have been for years.
Why not go to your bank and see if they can do a chargeback?
You may or may not already know this, but there is software that you can install across your devices that will manage passwords for you so that you’re not reusing them.
This is something everyone should be doing whether or not they've recently been scammed/stung/hacked/phished/whatever. As Kramer says the Apple ecosystem has it built in, other providers are also available such as 1Password or Bitwarden.
I think I’ll call my bank today,
On a plus side if you used Apple Pay the scammer shouldn't have your card info. But check also with Apply Pay - they have a dispute facility so see if non-receipt of goods is covered.
I automatically assume that everything advertised on Facebook is a scam of some kind (either nothing turns up or you get the nasty Temu clone of whatever they advertised).
I totally agree.
I will never buy anything from a FB advert.
If I see an offer from a company I recognise I won't click on the advert I will just go to their website on the browser.
Last Christmas I tried to order a book from an obscure site but my card was not accepted at check out so I tried my credit card and it too was declined so I gave up. Roll on a few months later and someone tried to empty both cards. thankfully caught by bank before they could, funnily enough one attempt was to buy a bike online in London at 1am (I am in Ireland) which raised a few questions from my wife about what was I up to🤣. The only place I had used both cards was this book site so I reckon they got my details when I tried to order then used the info I gave them to try and empty the accounts. Might be worth watching out for something similar happening.
I had something exactly the same - Couldn't identify the merchant, no receipt sent to my email. I simply did a reversal on the Amex card. Was never disputed.
Might be worth watching out for something similar happening.
One of the advantages of using Apple Pay (or PayPal for that matter)... no card details passed to the retailer (or fake retailer).
Got a little update;
I reported the issue to the bank and after asking a lot of automated questions and some consideration they have credited my account with a ‘temporary refund’ and raised a claim with the merchant on my behalf. If the merchant/scammer provides evidence that my claim is not valid in the next 35 days then the bank will redebit the amount, but I can’t see how they could do that. <br /><br />
So a cautiously good result. Will update further when I know more. Thanks all.
