Quick PayPal tip I discovered today

PostHoc25

I'm new to the forum so apologies if this needs to be moved to a different topic. I looked up and down the list and couldn't figure out where to put this tip/bit of helpful info.

I use PayPal a lot and recently signed up for a 95p one week trial of some software. Looking through the t&c about cancellation, because I used PayPal, I needed to go into PayPal and cancel future automatic payments from there.

Go to settings icon
Then payments
Then Automatic Payments

I saw and cancelled the software trial so I don't get charged £49 in a few days but then saw a huge list of retailers/services I had previously had on auto payment that whilst not actively charging me, still had permission to do so in the future. It displays two lists, Active and Inactive Pre-approved payments.

Lots on my list had not been charged in years, as far back as 2012! So I cancelled them all to be inactive.

If you are concerned about companies having access to your PayPal (I'm thinking in terms of any potential hacking/glitches) then I'd say it's well worth a look to see what companies could potentially charge you.

Again, nothing bad has happened, this is purely an act of caution having been with PayPal for donkeys years - clearly there have been no erroneous charges during all those years, but it's nice to know it's not even a possibility due to tech issues.

I had no clue this page of info even existed :-)

GreenScepter

Thanks for the reminder, it was something I vaguely knew about but never really bothered sorting before now. I just cancelled 14 automatic payment agreements for companies I either don't use anymore, or pay via different methods (my inbox is quite busy with automated paypal emails now!)

There were also a few permissions enabled in the "data and security" section for companies I have nothing to do with anymore, so I cancelled those too.

sausage_time

Very useful, thanks.  On the app (Android) I found the list by pressing "Accounts" (bottom bar) then scroll to "Autopay".  From there you can click on each payee then "Cancel Subscription".

ircE

Thanks for the tip! You'd think with the way regulations are going these links would be automatically severed after a set period of months/years without active payments...

drphila

Thanks OP. Just found around 50 active and 15 inactive!

PostHoc25

drphila said:

Thanks OP. Just found around 50 active and 15 inactive!

Wow! And I thought I had a lot! So glad it's been helpful :-)

Jordec

My husband has just been scammed out of £10500 by PayPal using an automatic payment that we didn’t authorise, but was set up with an £87.90 single purchase on Friday morning. Please report PayPal to the FCA. They want as much info as we can give them. I asked PayPal for proof I had authorised 14 on my account and they simply have requests from the merchant. Nothing from me, not even a ticked box! None of the automatic payments on my account have been abused, but I didn’t set them up and they shouldn’t be set up and putting my money at risk.

PostHoc25

Jordec said:

None of the automatic payments on my account have been abused, but I didn’t set them up 

Goodness that's awful. Thankfully all mine were ones I had agreed to previously but I'll certainly keep an eye out every month for any that I haven't authorised. There are so many subscription based services out there now and I use several for convenience, but it's absolutely a reminder for us to be vigilant.

I hope hubby gets some fraud help and is fully compensated. Clearly someone somewhere is bending rules as far as authorisations are concerned.  All the best.

Edit: Was just looking through the PayPal Notification pages in account settings. At the very least, one of the options should say "Email me when a new automatic payment is created/added" which it doesn't at present. That could be a quick interim fix PayPal could do while they figure out permission issues going forward. 

Chief_of_Staffy

Jordec said:

My husband has just been scammed out of £10500 by PayPal using an automatic payment that we didn’t authorise, but was set up with an £87.90 single purchase on Friday morning. Please report PayPal to the FCA. They want as much info as we can give them. I asked PayPal for proof I had authorised 14 on my account and they simply have requests from the merchant. Nothing from me, not even a ticked box! None of the automatic payments on my account have been abused, but I didn’t set them up and they shouldn’t be set up and putting my money at risk.

From what I gather you must have purchased from a scam website cloned from a genuine business. Always pays to check the URL. But yes, Paypal should have caught this immediately, as should your bank.

Naturelover22

Thank you for this information. I have never paid for anything recurring through Paypal but I had 12 retailers listed as far back as 2011!
I can only think there is something in the t&c that you can agree to this access when paying through paypal.

PostHoc25

Naturelover22 said:

Thank you for this information. I have never paid for anything recurring through Paypal but I had 12 retailers listed as far back as 2011!
I can only think there is something in the t&c that you can agree to this access when paying through paypal.

Glad it helped. Yes, I think you must be right. It's clearly a function they deem time-saving, but after reading everyone's comments I went back and double-checked - I had left ebay on there assuming it was current, but in fact the last time the specific payment had been used was back in 2019, so I deleted it too.

It feels like something that needs better clarity, I haven't checked but maybe there is a toggle to say, "don't store this information for future payments". If not, again, I feel they could probably add that for more autonomy.

I remember going through my credit file a few years ago and finding a mobile phone contract I had fully ended years prior. I'd switched providers but the old one was still shown as effectively active and so I did contact them to get it marked as closed. For me, a lot of it is just about wanting records to be accurate, more than huge data safety concerns :-)