Paypal scam or not?

[Newchodge]

Along with everyone else I have had loads of scam emails from banks, HMRC, Companies House etc, but I am not sure about this one:


Dear [My Name]

Your bank has let us know that there isn't a valid Direct Debit Instruction set up between PayPal and your bank account ending in ****. This means that you won't be able to use this bank account to fund any PayPal payments, but you may still withdraw money to it.

"How to make future payments with PayPal"

To use your bank account ending in **** to fund any future payments with PayPal, you'll need to re-submit the Direct Debit Instruction. To do this, log in to your PayPal account at
www.paypal.com/uk
https://www.paypal.com/uk/ and follow the instructions provided in the 'To Do' box.

Otherwise, you can use a card to fund your PayPal payments. To add a card, go to 'Profile' and then click 'My Money'.

If you already have a card linked to your PayPal account, we'll use it to fund your future payments.

Yours sincerely,
PayPal

Copyright © 1999-2014 PayPal. All rights reserved.

PayPal (Europe) S.à r.l. et Cie, S.C.A. Société en Commandite par Actions Registered Office: 22-24 Boulevard Royal L-2449, Luxembourg RCS Luxembourg B 118 349

PayPal PPC000107:


Unusually, this has my correct name and the **** are the final 4 digits of my bank account. I am suspicious because of the embedded link - I thought all companies these days asked you to log in but didn't give the address.

What do you think?

 

[finleydesign]

Just ignore it and go into paypal directly, not any links form emails and see what it says, or contact paypal!

 

[lynxus]

Likely a scam.
You dont need a direct debit for paypal to work with your bank anyway..

Plus, they would simply notify you via their control panel.

Ignore any emails like this from anyone!

 

[Newchodge]

I haven't used paypal for years anyway, so I would ignore it. It just worries me that they have my real name, including my formal first name which I only use on offcial documents, and the last 4 digits of my bank account number. All the other scams I have had have been lacking in specific detail.

 

[Raw Rob]

It looks real to me. Easy to tell, just log in to your PayPal account and if it is real it will have a notification for you telling you what you need to do. (Of course if you don't use PayPal anymore, best not to do anything, but at least you can set your mind at rest that it is real.)

 

[Newchodge]

I have logged onto Paypal and it does look as if it is probably real. However I forwarded it to their security department and their automatic response includes the advice not to use a link in an email to log onto their site.

So why include a link in their own email??

 

[beasty]

It is legit (The wording and process)

The source may not be, i.e. the email comes from somewhere else.

I am not sure paypal say NOT to use links, they send legit links all the time (I spend too much time speaking to these dumbasses) not a fan!

 

[thomascole]

Log into PayPal and see what your account says - if its an issue resolve it direct from your account.

Depending on your e-mail provider companies such as Google have added a verified tick next to the mail to show it is legitimate.

 

[Newchodge]

It is legit (The wording and process)

The source may not be, i.e. the email comes from somewhere else.

I am not sure paypal say NOT to use links, they send legit links all the time (I spend too much time speaking to these dumbasses) not a fan!

here is an extract from Paypal's automatic response:

READ!

Any time you receive an email about changes to your PayPal account, the
safest way to confirm the email?s validity is to log in to your PayPal
account where any of the activity reported in the email will be
available to view. DO NOT USE THE LINKS IN THE EMAIL RECEIVED TO VISIT
THE PAYPAL WEBSITE. Instead, enter www.paypal.com into your browser to
log in to your account.

Their capital letters. As I say, if that is their advice, why send the link?

 

[beasty]

It is good advice for ALL emails, but paypal regularly DO send links, the advice is still correct the SAFEST way is to go to your own account and not use the links as using the links means you might hit fake links some times.

Does not say paypal WILL NOT send links

it says

the SAFEST WAY is to go to paypal.com and log in, which is correct and you should do this with all emails where you have an account, bank, ebay, hmrc, paypal, all the same advice!

PAYPAL DO SEND LINKS THOUGH

 

[lynxus]

Post the headers here for the email.
Then we can tell if its real... If its come from a Paypal IP address / Server..

Either way, out of best practice.
Never click links in emails you were not expecting.

 

[Newchodge]

OK:

From [email protected] Thu Feb 20 09:29:52 2014
X-Apparently-To: ******* via 188.125.83.108; Thu, 20 Feb 2014 09:29:53 +0000
Return-Path: <[email protected]>
Received-SPF: pass (domain of paypal.co.uk designates 173.0.84.225 as permitted sender)
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X-Originating-IP: [173.0.84.225]
Authentication-Results: mta1027.mail.ir2.yahoo.com from=paypal.co.uk; domainkeys=neutral (no sig); from=paypal.co.uk; dkim=pass (ok)
Received: from 127.0.0.1 (EHLO mx0.slc.paypal.com) (173.0.84.225)
by mta1027.mail.ir2.yahoo.com with SMTP; Thu, 20 Feb 2014 09:29:53 +0000
DKIM-Signature: v=1; a=rsa-sha256; d=paypal.co.uk; s=pp-dkim1; c=relaxed/relaxed;
q=dns/txt; [email protected]; t=1392888592;
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Received: (qmail 4077 invoked by uid 993); 20 Feb 2014 09:29:52 -0000
Date: Thu, 20 Feb 2014 01:29:52 -0800
Message-Id: <[email protected]>
AMQ-Delivery-Message-Id: EMAILDELIVERY-Notification_EmailDeliveryEvent-49-1392888585196-1471642813
PP-Correlation-Id: 4b70c815ca769
Subject: Funding your PayPal payments
X-MaxCode-Template: PPC000107
To: *******
From: "[email protected]" <[email protected]>
Content-Transfer-Encoding: base64
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=UTF-8
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Length: 1510

 

[Excel Expert]

Dont PayPal usually avoid including links in their emails?

Best way to check is simply to log in to your PayPal account (not using the links in the email) where you should see a notification along the same lines as the email. If there is no notification then maybe you need to do some more digging to see what is happening.