strange email from paypal

The most important thing with all these scams/emails is to never to click on any link in the email. Open a new page and type the address in.

I am always very wary - what a shame that we need to be.

I get these emails from PayPal, trouble is, I don’t have an account with them. Scams!

What midgey says is what you should do with all these things.

NEVER click on a link in an email is a safe rule.

Thanks for the replies.
As Lucky says, what a shame we have to be so wary.

I get these frequently. Just delete.

Oh dear, and here was I hoping Mr Olufulake Adegbolaga, Minister of Finance in Nigeria was going to send me that $500,000US for my reirement fund

I've had two of these scam emails just this week - one from PayPal and one from Amazon! I checked each site directly for their "report spam/scam" directions and forwarded the emails (without opening them) but last month I got scammed by a fake online business. I was looking for a specific MP3 player and found one for sale on a page that looked real. They even sent me an email verifying my purchase with tracking information! When I tried to track it on UPS a few days later it was "not found" and the webpage ended up being just an excellent looking fake. Thankfully, Discover reimbursed me.

gmarie, I haven't heard of that one before. How do you tell if a site is genuine or not?
I recently wanted a VCR machine and, of course, they are not made any more. However, I found a site which was selling re-conditioned ones. I was wary but went ahead and ordered one. No problems...very pleased with the service and the item. However, it could easily have been a fake.

Report this kind of thing to Action Fraud.

ladymuck, I searched for the item on Google and went to the product page to check it out. Everything worked there - description, the cart, even links at the bottom to contact the company, etc.- all just like an actual page. I got the confirmation email with the tracking button to check once the item had been processed in a few days.

Then, when I tried tracking 3 days later, nothing showed up so I went back to the product page, found their email address, and sent them a query. The email delivery failed, so I Googled the company and and checked there. It looked just like any other store home page except that it was just a very slick facade. You couldn't actually search for anything and their drop down lists, etc. lead nowhere. At that point, the original product page had disappeared, too. Total scam.

There are lots of email PayPal scams. Check they call you by name at the start of the email. PayPal does but scams never do.

Be careful about the TV licence scam too. It's a very good email that informs you that your Direct Debit has failed and asks you to follow the link to reset it.

I had one today telling me my Amazon Prime account is about to end. I didn't know I had one so not sure whether to click or not. You have made me think I won't bother.

A while back I was scammed on my Paypal account.
My bank statement showed 2 odd payments (in Chinese) for around £200.
The only thing I had ordered was a small plastic tool on amazon. costing £2
I informed Paypal who said they would deal with it but TBH nothing happened quickly and I was out of pocket for about a month.
The money was replaced by Paypal. However if it wasn't so convenient, I would never use Paypal again.

My OH, who knows about these things, says "always check the sender's email address". This often gives an insight into where the mails have come from. If in doubt, leave it out!

Thanks for the replies.
Just to say that my paypal account seems to be back to normal now. So I don't know whether it was a scam or not.

Did it address you by name or email address? If PayPal write to you they always use your name.

I had one of these emails. I thought it was a scam so I did not click the link. Later I logged into my account and there were no recent transactions to be seen, as expected.

I have just received the scam from the TV licence people. They even got the amount wrong. Also a phone call regarding problems with my Amazon account - I do not have one!!

I had a weird situation with these folks as well. Suddenly started getting thank you e mails for purchases of very expensive handbags at Luis Vuitton.....good taste anyway...marked EBay and PayPal. Had not used PayPal in years and then only for EBay purchases. Talked to Vuiton Corporate, EBay, PayPal. And bank. Purses were indeed bought...they put a flag in my acct. to stop anymore purchases, EBay and PayPal were aware of others having this issue and closed both accounts and notified fraud alert....no money had been received by them. Bank put alert on acct to not pay LV, EB orPP and notified fraud alert. One suggestion PP andEB accounts were very old. Be sure to close any account you aren't using and get email verification.

It is quite difficult to distinguish the genuine from a scam letter or email. I had one from my bank after Xmas it looked dodgy so I contacted the bank separately and it took 3 weeks to determine it was genuine.

I have just had one from Virgin Media, addressing my by my email address, e.g [email protected], saying my direct debit hadn't gone through.
My DD was due to go through and it looked genuine. However, I'm not that daft, I ignored the link they sent me and checked my actual Virgin account. The email was a fake.

If you click on the address of the email sender you can usually tell if the email is a scam. [email protected] is a give away

I've posted this before but I'm repeating it.
Do not leave your card on Amazon. There are more scams on that site than we hear about.
It only takes a few seconds to delete/add your card. Better to be safe than sorry.

I have google mail and rarely get these emails as they are filtered out.