Consumer complaint received 2025-12-21 00:00:00
Product: Money transfer, virtual currency, or money service — Mobile or digital wallet
Issue: Confusing or misleading advertising or marketing — 
Company: Paypal Holdings, Inc
State: FL

Complaint narrative:
PayPal is violating its advertised Buyer Protection guarantees and engaging in unfair, deceptive, and abusive dispute practices by systematically closing disputes in favor of large merchants without conducting a meaningful review or disclosing the basis for its decisions.

I filed multiple disputes with PayPal concerning digital goods purchased through XXXX XXXX XXXX that were unusable and significantly not as described. Due to a documented account defect, the product could not be used as intended. I lost access to my original account and all prior purchases and was forced to start over, rendering all previous spending worthless. I submitted screenshots, written explanations, and detailed documentation supporting this loss.

Despite this evidence, PayPal denied my disputes and relied exclusively on a large merchants generic policy statements that did not address my account-specific defect, loss of access, or unusable product. PayPal refused to explain the factual or policy basis for its decisions and issued brief, conclusory responses that appeared designed to close the case quickly rather than evaluate the evidence.

PayPals conduct is deceptive because it advertises Buyer Protection while, in practice, denying consumers any meaningful protection when a large merchant is involved. Consumers are led to believe disputes will be reviewed fairly and based on evidence, when in reality PayPal appears to defer automatically to major platform merchants and disregard consumer documentation. 

PayPals conduct is unfair because consumers suffer financial harm without a reasonable ability to avoid it. Once PayPal closes a dispute, it provides no explanation, no transparency, and no meaningful opportunity to appeal. In my case, PayPal represented that an appeal was available and displayed an appeal deadline, but failed to provide any functioning mechanism to submit an appeal.

PayPals conduct is abusive because it exploits the imbalance of power between individual consumers and large merchants. By refusing to explain decisions, withholding the evidence relied upon, and issuing hasty closures, PayPal prevents consumers from understanding, challenging, or correcting errors, while protecting merchant relationships at the consumers expense. 

Further, PayPal falsely claimed that it had responded to me by email regarding this matter. No such communication was sent to the email address associated with my PayPal account or complaint. This raises additional concerns regarding the accuracy and reliability of PayPals dispute communications and recordkeeping.

As a direct result of these practices, and to limit further consumer harm, I have canceled all subscriptions and discontinued use of PayPal for future transactions. I no longer trust PayPals Buyer Protection process to function as represented, particularly when disputes involve large merchants. This decision was made solely to prevent additional losses resulting from PayPals dispute practices.

I am requesting that the CFPB investigate whether PayPals Buyer Protection program is being misrepresented to consumers and whether PayPals dispute and appeal practices constitute unfair, deceptive, or abusive acts or practices under federal consumer financial protection law. PayPals current practices deny consumers the protections they are promised while insulating large merchants from accountability.

Company response to consumer: Closed with explanation