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Paypal & Bill Me Later Scam Nightmare

November 11, 2009 by debbie T | Internet • Ramblings
Updated 2009-11-18: Justin from Bill Me Later left a message on our answering machine tonight. He read my blog and wanted to discuss my problem. Yay! I phoned him back, and he is crediting my account in full. Hopefully, my next statement will be zero. And again, it wasn’t the $25 that I cared about. It was that I opened a new credit account and it felt like a huge waste. But I am satisfied now, but the only reason I got help was because I wrote this article, so it’s a bittersweet victory, but a victory nonetheless.
Updated 2009-12-11: See below for new updated screen shots of another email I received from Paypal with the same offer!

OMG, today is the last straw! I am sooo sooo angry and upset with Bill Me Later. And I am most upset with myself for not listening to my instincts.

My advice to EVERYONE, if you receive a pre-approved email from Paypal offering you a credit for $25 or more to use Bill Me Later, RUN AWAY! Don’t fall for it. It’s a complete scam!

It’s been a constant battle to deal with them from the beginning, even before I made my purchase. They are poorly trained (and informed) and now they are refusing to apply the credit! Thankfully, I only spent $26, so it was a cheap lesson to learn.

Let’s start at the beginning! I received TWO official emails from Paypal at the beginning of October:

Do you like choices? We thought so. That’s why you’ve got a brand new choice from PayPal. Shop now – and pay for your purchases later. It’s called Bill Me Later®.

Just check out with PayPal as usual when you shop online. Choose our Bill Me Later option, and you can pay when it’s right for you: now – or later.*

Even better, you’re pre-approved. Shop by 10/31/09 and get up to $25 off your first purchase and no payments for 90 days.
Sound good? Start shopping at one of our participating stores – just a few of the thousands that accept PayPal.
Get up to 25 dollars off and no payments for 90 days
Want to know more? Check it out!

Sounds great, right? My DH needed to purchase something on Ebay. Two separate merchants, I purchased with my Paypal account, and there was absolutely no option to choose “Bill Me Later”

I called Paypal a couple of times, no one knows anything about the promotion (and I assure you, it was an official email, they were just ill-informed) so they pass the buck over to Bill Me Later, who were equally idiotic.

Bill Me Later customer service told me that perhaps the Ebay merchants weren’t included in the 1000′s of merchants (even though it clearly stated on the FAQ that Ebay was included). No one was able to offer any insight to the details of this promotion.

I put the email aside, and really didn’t want to deal with it. I should have listened to that “little voice” and just walked away from the deal. Eh, it was only $25 credit (others were receiving $100 credits – my God, thank you that I didn’t receive one of those, as I would now be paying for $100 of merchandise)

But my inner greed took over and I sat down on October 28 (three days before the Oct 31st deadline) to find something to buy for around $25. I finally decided to purchase two books from Walmart.

So, my cart was filled, and I clicked the “check out with Paypal” button. I signed into my Paypal account (the same account that the email was sent to). I tried to change my Payment Options, and as with Ebay earlier, there was absolutely NO OPTION to change the payment to Bill Me Later. See my screenshot below:

Bill Me Later scam

I was livid, so I phoned Bill Me Later again. The customer service rep told me that I should using the Paypal link, but to use the normal check out process and choose “Bill Me Later” as the payment. So, that is what I did, and it appeared to work. EXCEPT, I then received a “Welcome to Bill Me Later” email with the email address that I used for Walmart, NOT the email address that the original offer was sent to.

Oh crap! I called Bill Me Later, and they assured me that they would send a request through to their Account Resolution department and I would have an answer in 5-7 business days.

So, today I receive an email from Bill Me Later (using a Do Not Reply email – grrrr)

Dear Debbie xxxx,

We have received your inquiry about your Bill Me Later® account. Unfortunately, we were not able to apply the promotional credit you requested. The promotional credit with Wal-Mart was not being offered. If however you can provide proof of the offer we will be able to research this further.

Sincerely,
Melissa
Bill Me Later Inc. ®
Customer Care
Financial Services for Bill Me Later® are provided by CIT Bank, Salt Lake City, Utah.

Okay, first off, no telephone number? No last name? No return email address? Talk about wonderful customer service.

Secondly, who said anything about a promotional credit with Wal-Mart? The promotion was offered through Paypal and Bill Me Later! One more moronic statement to add to the pile.

So, of course, at this point I am beyond angry. Beyond being reasonable!

I phoned Bill Me Later. Spoke to “Scott” who listened to my ranting, and ended up giving me his “fake” email address (that bounced) swahba@billmelater.com telling me to forward the email I received to him. As I said, the email ended up being fake, so of course, that made me even angrier! grrrr. I phoned them again, and the new person forwarded my call to Matt who was in the “Account Resolution” department.

At this point, all three people at Bill Me Later kept mentioning the “promotional credit with Wal-Mart”! And it set me off every time! Why do you think this is a promotion from Wal-Mart??? It was an email from Paypal and Bill Me Later!!!! I was screaming I was so upset! (note, yeah, I know you can get more flies with honey, but I was beyond angry, and there was no calming me down!)

So, Matt told me to forward him the original email, which I did. He phoned me in a few minutes and told me that because I didn’t go through Paypal’s checkout, I was out of luck (I am paraphrasing of course)

What??? What? WHAAAATTTT? I screamed bloody murder. That is what I tried to do (at least three times with Ebay and Walmart) and there is no option for Bill Me Later when checking out with Paypal. Matt calmly “assured” me (yeah, oh I love that word, assured) that there certainly was an option.

Show me where then! To this day, no one can tell me! Know why? Because it’s impossible, because it’s a total scam! You will receive the promotional email, you will try to make a purchase, and you will end up being stuck with the charges yourself because they won’t give you the credit. Thankfully, in my case, it was only $25, but others might not be so lucky.

I am thinking I might return one of the books to Walmart anyway. So, it won’t be too bad.

Oh Gawd, I really really really hate Bill Me Later!!!

ETA: It appears I am not the only one that didn’t see any option for Bill Me Later when using Paypal for checkout.
http://www.fatwallet.com/forums/finance/958748/

And the internet is riddled with Bill Me Later complaints dating back years ago. It appears they have a reputation for their lack of customer service skills and sweeping problems under the rug.
http://www.google.com/search?q=bill+me+later+scam
http://www.google.com/search?q=bill+me+later+fraud
http://news.cnet.com/2100-1017-960380.html

This complaint from 2005 sounds so similar to my situation. They pass it to the “Accounts Resolution” department, and then after their investigation, they deny that there was a promo for Walmart, Amazon or whichever store you used for the purchase! Wow. They are still doing the same thing four years later!

I really want to close out the account, as I don’t want to give them the satisfaction of having me as a customer, but I am afraid it will hinder my credit. I have excellent credit, and from what I have read, by opening the account, they did a “hard pull” on my credit account, which reduces my credit score a few points for 6 months or so. If I close the account, I have a feeling it might also affect my score. Something to check out!

UPDATE: Just received an email from Matt (in reply to my email with an attached screenshot of my Paypal screen with no payment option for Bill Me Later)

Again I apologize for the frustration that this issue has caused, and I want to assure you that we are committed to providing you the best service that we can. There has been some confusion during the release of this new offer through PayPal, and many of our agents including myself have not been giving the right information.

The heart of this issue seems to be this, though Walmart may be a Paypal merchant they are not offering Bill Me Later through PayPal at this time. This is likely because Walmart is one of our regular Bill Me Later merchants. In the future it is likely that Walmart will be available with Bill Me Later through the PayPal wallet but it is currently not offered.

Also addressing your issues using Bill Me Later through the PayPal wallet on eBay, likely the merchant you attempted to use was also not offered. Unfortunately there is no list of merchants that offer this payment method, because of the large number of merchants on eBay all desiring different methods it would be virtually impossible to list them all. So in the future if you desire to use Bill Me Later through the PayPal wallet and receive your $25 merchant reward if you do not see the option at your point of purchase you will know that it is not offered. Then you will be able to back out of your order if you so desire.

Again Ms. xxx, I apologize for the inconvenience that this has caused and appreciate your patience with this issue.

This makes this promotion look more fraudulent by the minute. How could they possibly offer this promotion and not know who was participating? And I think his excuse is a bullsh*t answer anyway.

What’s happening is NO merchants are set up to use Bill Me Later through Paypal. That’s what I think! Why wouldn’t they all be set up? If a merchant like Walmart is set up to receive both Paypal and Bill Me Later, how difficult would it be to merge the two? And furthermore, how could they possibly roll out this promotion when even the merchants listed in the actual email weren’t in participation? I checked back in October, and at least one of the three wasn’t set up! Sorry, but that is misleading!

Scam scam scam. Stay away from Paypal and Bill Me Later or you’ll be sorry!

UPDATED 2009-12-11: I just received another pre-approval offer from Paypal for $25 and no payments until April 2010.

new pre-approved offer from paypal for $25 and no payments until april 2010

I decided to test it out, so I went to Barnes & Noble and added a random item to the shopping cart. I typed my info in the first few forms, and when it go to the payment options, I chose Paypal. As soon as I logged into Paypal, a window popped up informing me that I was pre-approved for Bill Me Later.

popup window telling me I was pre-approved for bill me later

I closed the window, and there was definitely an option for Bill Me Later as a payment choice using my Paypal account.

option in paypal to use bill me later

So, it looks like maybe Paypal and Bill Me Later are getting their act together. We’ll see. Stay alert everyone, and if you do go for your $25 or $100 pre-approval account, please double check to make sure you are purchasing through Paypal. If there isn’t an option for Bill Me Later through Paypal, then you won’t get your credit.

There are 24 comments

  1. I too am in the middle of this BML scam nightmare. I was offered $100 through the paypal transaction and they have completely blown me off… my first payment is due in a week and I keep calling them to discuss the matter and they completely stonewall me. I will tell everyone to promptly ignore their offers and invite BML to fornicate themselves.

    Comment by Mike on November 20th, 2009

  2. Mike, I am so sorry you are going through this. I have a feeling there are a lot of people having this same problem too!

    When I talked to Justin, he assured me that they “learned from this” and will be implementing changes to the way these problems are handled. He said my issue should have been escalated to a supervisor/manager when I called.

    Have you asked for a supervisor when you call? That might help.

    Also, if you are still having problems, email me (there is a contact link at the bottom of the page) and maybe I can contact Jason for you, and ask him if I can give you his contact name and phone number.

    Good luck! It’s really a bad situation they put themselves into, and the backlash is only going to get worse!

    Comment by debbie T on November 23rd, 2009

  3. Well, for starters, you are right that the wording of the promotion makes it sound like you can use it on any ebay purchase, which is not correct. Most ebay sellers do not offer Bill Me Later as a payment option – this option is in addition to regular Paypal payments.

    However, Matt is also correct in that there are hundreds of online merchants who use Paypal’s checkout service, and not all of them use Bill Me Later! I can assure you, some of them do. Buy.com is an example. I received the same promotion, but unlike you, I am not paying for any purchase up front – that’s the whole point of Bill Me Later anyways, even aside from the $25 promotion. You should not have paid for anything up front. You checkout using Bill Me Later, and then within the 90 days, you account is credited for up to $25.

    Comment by Nick on November 30th, 2009

  4. Nick, not sure what you mean by “not paying for any purchase up front”. I didn’t pay anything up front – if you read my full article, I checked out with BML at Walmart.com.

    If you read the promo wording correctly, it states that you must check out through Paypal, and ONLY THEN choose Bill Me Later.

    Just check out with PayPal as usual when you shop online. Choose our Bill Me Later option, and you can pay when it’s right for you: now – or later.

    I just checked Buy.com, and just like Walmart, there is no option for Bill Me Later using Paypal.

    I have yet to see one merchant that offers BML as a payment option using Paypal! And I checked a lot of them.

    I hope you get your credit, but if you checked out using BML, not Paypal/BML, then I have a feeling you won’t. Good luck!

    Comment by debbie T on November 30th, 2009

  5. Yeah, I got the same deal email and was hoping to get some good deal out of the $25 link, I’m glad that I found your article so I don’t have to waste time calling them when I realize the big scam this is. I was going to get $25 gift card from walmart and couldn’t see the ship-to-store option so I google to be sure. I will try find other store that do offer it, people who have used it please post the store that offer billmelater through paypal.

    Comment by hanson on December 11th, 2009

  6. Bestbuy.com is one that works.

    Comment by hanson on December 11th, 2009

  7. Thanks Hanson.

    If you can believe it, I just received another “preapproval” email from Paypal for $25 with no payments until April 2010.

    It specifically lists Ebay, Delta, Snapfish and Barnes & Noble.

    I checked Barnes & Noble and yep, they are finally on the ball with a Bill Me Later choice using Paypal.

    I attached a couple of new screen shots in an update to the article.

    Comment by debbie T on December 11th, 2009

  8. So I used it at Bestbuy.com, and thought everything worked, at Paypal’s final screen, after I clicked “Pay Now” button, it transfer me back to Bestbuy and tell me that there is something wrong with my payment from paypal, and then it tells me to choose another payment method. Then of course, I submit a complaint email to Bestbuy.com. I only received a automatic response from bestbuy.com. Today I received a email from BillMeLater, which I copied & pasted below, I may have used my cellphone instead of home phone, but I think they are being really tricky…

    We’re sorry. Bill Me Later was unable to authorize your recent attempt(s) to use Bill Me Later because there was a problem with the information that was submitted to us.

    There are a number of reasons this may have occurred. The information you provided may have been incomplete or inaccurate or may have suggested that the purchase was not made by you. Below are a few common situations that can cause a problem with a purchase:

    * You may have used a different name than you used to open your account.
    * You may have provided your work address instead of your home address as your billing address (where you receive bills, credit card bills, etc.)
    * You may have provided your work phone number or cell phone number instead of your home phone number.
    * You may have inaccurately entered the last four digits of your Social Security Number or your date of birth.
    * You may have provided your initials, company name, or family name instead of your full, legal name.
    * You may have provided an email address that is not registered to you.

    If you wish to try Bill Me Later again, please keep the above in mind when entering your personal information.

    We appreciate your business and thank you for choosing Bill Me Later.

    Sincerely,

    Bill Me Later
    Customer Care

    FEDERAL EQUAL CREDIT OPPORTUNITY ACT NOTICE
    The Federal Equal Credit Opportunity Act prohibits creditors from discriminating against credit applicants on the basis of race, color, religion, national origin, sex, marital status, age (provided the applicant has the capacity to enter into a binding contract); because all or part of the applicant’s income derives from any public assistance program; or because the applicant has in good faith exercised any right under the Consumer Credit Protection Act. The federal agency that administers compliance with this law concerning this creditor is the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation, Division of Supervision and Consumer Protection, 2345 Grand Boulevard, Suite 100 Kansas City, MO 64108-2638.

    Comment by hanson on December 12th, 2009

  9. There sure are a lot of hoops to go through for $25. I really wish I listened to my instincts and never did it!

    Comment by debbie T on December 13th, 2009

  10. I too am having problems, but it seems the opposite of others – my paypal always comes up with the bill me later option, and I have to change it to credit card – even though my default payment method is credit card. I am sending in a check to pay all on the account then asking them to close my account.
    I guess I was lucky and got my $100 out of it, but lost some points on my credit card.

    Comment by Paul on December 17th, 2009

  11. oh that is a pain, isn’t it? I think I might cancel my account too. I just don’t think I would use it again.

    I am glad you received your $100 though!

    Comment by debbie T on December 19th, 2009

  12. When I applied for an account with Bill Me Later with promise of a $25.00 Off purchase, I also received the exact email you listed above denying me an account. My credit rating is excellent and thier excuse was also that One of the Credit Rating companies wouldn’t give them my credit rating.
    Bill Me Later and PAYPAL are nothing but LOAN SHARKING Companies, that will wreck your credit ratings, steer clear of them. If your late on payments to them you can expect 29% interest charged to whatever you purchase.

    Comment by S on December 25th, 2009

  13. how about all of us who are billed for transactions i.e. joining earthlink for 21.95 when you did not and they charge you 20.00 a month late fees and 2.00+ interest a month but don’t even send you a bill for 4 months. When you fnally find out you have a bogus bill with them they agree to settle the now $105.00 balance for the original 21.95 you never actually charged.
    What a scam! They threaten your credit and tell you it is your responsibility to notifiy the police. Does anyone have any suggestions on other organizations besides BBB I should notify?
    Julie in Virginia

    Comment by julie on January 5th, 2010

  14. I just ordered using BML for the first time Tuesday night. I have a PayPal account and since eBay owns PayPal and BML (and after a quick search online for ‘bill me later review’ and finding a good report), I decided to use them to save $25.

    I didn’t care about the 90 days as I’m going to pay right away after I get the statement.

    Apparently, the statements doesn’t show in my PayPal account until the product ships so it showed $0 balance untill today. Unfortunately it reflects the full amount, although my receipt from the merchant has a line that says “special offer: $25 off and 90 days… via bml”

    Strange thing is..

    I thought that BML would be the one to pay the merchant, but it was me who paid them in full. Then immediately BML credited my PayPal with the full amount paid to the vendor.

    At this early stage, I’m not sure why the statement isn’t reflecting the $25 credit. I’ve emailed them and will call them tonight to see why this is. Maybe there’s a couple of days ‘waiting period’ first?

    I really hope all goes through as advertised. At least, I feel better knowing that there’s proof of the “$25 off and 90 days” offer reflected in my email receipt.

    If I do in fact get the credit, then maybe I’ll have a positive report later.

    Otherwise, I’ll be contacting Clark Howard on his national radio show.

    I’ll update later.

    Comment by David on January 7th, 2010

  15. David, since I purchased through BML, it posted to my new BML account. I don’t know where or how it bills if you use the Paypal Bill Me Later option. I assume it would also be a separate account for BML, but I could be wrong.

    Yes, please keep us up to date on what happens to your account and how it ends up for you.

    Good luck!

    Comment by debbie T on January 11th, 2010

  16. I work at a retailer I wont say who but I have noticed that if you dont already have a BML account you never get approved. They are the worst. We have tons of customers that want to use BML and they all get denied I just wonder why we even offer this cause it is crap.

    Comment by Bev on February 7th, 2010

  17. With difficulty, I located two companies selling hard to find old, out of print books online, which I wanted. The sellers were unknown to me but accepted PayPal payment for direct purchase (not through Amazon.com). I completed one PayPal order w/o problem but the other, also a PayPal accepter, provided no other option but to use BillMeLater to complete the transaction.
    I had never heard of BillMeLater but I used it because the book is very hard to find. My Visa made payment for one book but BML sent me a letter asking me to register an account which I never authorized and make payment for the other purchase after I registered (with an unknown to me) account number. SCAM??

    Comment by Bill S. on February 16th, 2010

  18. I’m glad you got it figured out. For me, I’m still in dispute with BML, and now their debt collector henchmen, NCO Financial.

    For all of you who are angry, please join the new Facebook page for support from others who have been screwed and also the latest articles on their consumer fraud lawsuit in California.
    “I Got Screwed by Bill Me Later”

    http://www.facebook.com/topic.php?topic=11003&post=59001&uid=12064179135#!/pages/I-Got-Screwed-by-Bill-Me-Later/261950692115?ref=ts

    Comment by kh on February 16th, 2010

  19. Paypal sent me an offer on 2/4/2010 for $10 off and 90 day deferred payment if I chose BillMeLater through Paypal. Being untrusting of offers such as this, I read the fine print and found a merry-go-round of Catch22 mutually impossible conditions.

    1. The Paypal offer email sez you MUST choose Paypal at check-out and will find the BillMeLater option on your Paypal account. (It WAS NOT there.)

    2. The details link in the Paypal email for offer conditions “This is an exclusive offer just for you and is not transferable. Details” took me to a Paypal webpage that sez:

    “How do I start using Bill Me Later?
    Just select Bill Me Later as your payment choice when you check out. You’ll give your date of birth and the last 4 digits of your social security number, accept the terms, and you’re done. Approval takes only seconds. Once you’ve started using Bill Me Later, you’ll see it as a payment option when you check out with PayPal.”

    So…I can ONLY use this offer if I use Paypal at checkout BUT the Bill Me Later option won’t appear on my Palpal account UNTIL I start using Bill Me Later. HUH??

    Thanks for sharing your trials and tribulations – I’m going to delete the lousy email and forget about getting a $10 credit (not the same as $10 off my order BTW) on yet another credit card acct. with 19.99 % interest that I don’t need.

    Comment by ngc on February 27th, 2010

  20. Hello, I too had problems with finding the link to BML when using paypal to checkout after winning a ebay item. At first,PP instructed me to go ahead and use my PP account to pay for my item and they then would transfer that purchase to my existing BML account. Even though the alarm bells were ringing in my head,I went ahead and finished the purchase. Big Mistake! The total amount was larger than what I usually will spend on this type of an item,but it was unique and bargain priced. Of course PP never got the transaction transferred over to BML,so the charge to my checking account was made immediately which put me into a short term cash crunch. I knew I would be receiving checks shortly,so my need was only for a few days thank God. Lucky for me I kept great notes of everyone I had talked with,including dates and times along with discussion notes and email copies,so I was able to retrace my steps. After several more calls and emails I finally got PP to transfer the charge properly to BML and reverse the initial PP deduction. After all this, an easy fix was discovered to get the BML link to appear. What needs to be done is quite easy: log into your PP account and change your default payment source to BML, rather than the bank account you are currently set up on. So simple,but effective! I’veused PP several times since and each time BML came up as an option to select.

    Hope this helps someone else out,since PP has always hired idiots and never trained them. Maybe idiots are not trainable? Good luck out there!

    Comment by Martin hahn on May 7th, 2010

  21. Thanks Martin! Hard to believe they still haven’t got their stuff together after all these months!

    Comment by debbie T on May 7th, 2010

  22. My wife brought some stuff and use this Bill me later crap using my information, she set up account in my name and told me she has 90 days to pay for stuff.2 week later in come the bill that I did not pay any mind to it .I got 90 days right, Wrong, these F-ing fool then began call my phone at all hours asking for payment and telling me I will be charge a late fee.I got piss off at my wife first then at these fool. Log into account pay it off then asked these fool to closed the account, do you know 4 months later these fools have all excuses not close my accoun.What an f-ing waste.

    Comment by markie on June 30th, 2010

  23. Sorry to hear all the trouble with this option…I happen to like BML a lot. I use it to buy stuff from Newegg all of the time, and I bought my computer that way and haven’t had any fees or headaches. This BML through PayPal sounds like too many hoops to jump through, they should have made it clearer who was participating and who was not.

    I like having BML as an option instead of using my credit card because most times you can take 3 or 6 months to pay stuff off with no interest. I will triple check if I ever see the BML/PayPal option though.

    Hope everyone got their situations under control :)

    Comment by Nadool on August 12th, 2010

  24. I made a purchase of $302.29 through Overstock.com and was offered 10 percent off my purchase and 90 days no pay through BML. I could have afforded to pay for it in 30 days but decided to get $30.29 I’d try this option. They have now told me I couldn’t get this offer through Overstock though that was the only way I’d heard of it. It has been 84 days now and they haven’t charged me interest and in spite of a half dozen emails I have had no satisfaction. Really frustrating, I wish I hadn’t done it. Very misleading.

    Comment by Karen on August 18th, 2010

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