Paid wrong person on Venmo

[Anonymous]

So my husband just gave the wrong person $3,000 on Venmo.

He, of course, contacted the person and asked for the money back and filled out the Venmo form for support. Has anyone had any luck getting money back sent in error? Sick to my stomach.

[Anonymous]

Just a heads up. I do a lot of large transactions on Venmo (I have a short term rental). I ALWAYS have people Ames me $1 first so there are no mix ups. Once I get that then they send me the large payment

[Anonymous]

You are so SOL. Welcome to Fintech!

[Anonymous]

Omg!! Did he skip the step where he verified the phone number?

[Anonymous]

Oh man that sucks. My worst fear. I hate that the profile pics are so small because I can't always tell if it's the right person or not. Good luck.

[Anonymous]

Nope he’s out of luck. And the person who received it should not give it back because it’s a well known scam and there’s no way for them to know it was a genuine mistake and not a scam.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Nope he’s out of luck. And the person who received it should not give it back because it’s a well known scam and there’s no way for them to know it was a genuine mistake and not a scam.

Yes. Never send money back if you receive unexpected funds. From a stranger. The scammer uses a stolen credit card to send the money. Since it’s fraud, that money will never clear, but the scammer messages Venmo users quickly before they realize that. So then, the money sent back to the scammer is straight from the Venmo user’s own bank account.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Omg!! Did he skip the step where he verified the phone number?

Yes.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Oh man that sucks. My worst fear. I hate that the profile pics are so small because I can't always tell if it's the right person or not. Good luck.

+1
Not that it would necessarily prevent scams, but those truly unhelpful tiny pics are ripe for a UX redesign.

[Anonymous]

OP here. Thanks. I was afraid of this. Had no idea about the scam part so that sucks. I'm hoping our bank can dispute it when it hits his account. We're going to go ahead and pay the actual person we owe though. Crap-freakin'tastic.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Omg!! Did he skip the step where he verified the phone number?

Yes.

Ridiculous that there isn’t mandatory verification/authentication. You should not be able to opt out.

[Anonymous]

Get a charge back from your bank

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Get a charge back from your bank

Thanks! Yes - we're going to try this.

[Anonymous]

Were the funds inadvertently sent to a person that he knows? Only my known contacts show in Cash App, so it would be near impossible to send money to a stranger.

My cousin's son mistakenly sent me $30 once, which I promptly returned.

[Anonymous]

So clearly Venmo is not for you.

This is exactly why I link Venmo to a particular low balance account, used only for that. That way if I am hacked or stupid my losses are limited. I keep about $500 there.

With your DH, he should just not be using Venmo.