My Paypal debit card was somehow compromised and the criminals bought Catholic books of all things, in addition to some random Yahoo Voice $1.00 transaction.
I had apparently linked my checking account debit card to my Paypal debit card sometime in the past. When I went to buy Taco Bell the other night, prior to realizing this compromise had happened, I went into ‘backup funding’ through Paypal.
Paypal wouldn’t allow me to unlink the bank account debit card, so I had to cancel it the next day. I figured that Paypal had already obtained the authorization so the existing ‘backup funding’ transaction for Taco Bell was taken care of.
Apparently it wasn’t authorized through the debit card, so what did Paypal do to fund the payment? …hit my checking account, the one I have to have setup so that I can transfer money away from Paypal.
They weren’t supposed to use that as backup funding for the Paypal debit card. I never set the checking account up as a backup funding source. I’ve come to find out that a bank account is the defacto funding source for all Paypal transactions. There’s no way to turn off that “feature” either.
They won’t allow me to remove the checking account from my Paypal account either, because that damned Taco Bell transaction is still pending.
Now it looks like I need to close my checking account too. Nobody at Paypal can tell me for certain that the $1.00 pending authorization won’t empty my checking account if it comes through for something greater than $1.00.
It’s ridiculous that they take the stance of ‘let the criminals make a mess.’ It doesn’t matter if there’s a 100% guarantee against unauthorized transactions when you’re unable to pay your bills when they’re due, but instead have to wait weeks for resolution.
I don’t think I’ll ever use that Paypal debit card again… once it’s eventually reissued, which is another serious bit of ridiculousness. I need to “re-apply” for the cards, they’re not just automatically reissued when reported stolen like any other issuer would do.
