Who's Maureen?

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Queried a payment with my bank which I was unsure about.

I opened an online chat and was told the originator was JPMC Re Paypal. There was also a Bournemouth address and phone number.

JPMC meant absolutely nothing to me. I asked if there was a company name (aside from Paypal) or product or service associated with this payment. I was told that was all the information they had.

So I rang CS and they investigated. I was told that because it was a Paypal payment, I would be better talking to Paypal. They told me they had a contact name and number for Paypal: Maureen Whitmarsh and an 01202 number. They told me these payments had been going out of our account since March 2016, one month after we opened it.

I queried the fact that in my list of DDs (in my banking app), there were two entries mentioning "Paypal". One that said "Paypal Payment" and another that said "JPMC Re Paypal".
I was expecting the second entry to have the payment I was questioning listed under it, as it matched exactly the originator of that payment.

But to my surprise, there were no payments listed under "JPMC Re Paypal" DD entry. The amount in question was listed under "Paypal Payment", along with other things I recognised that I had paid for using Paypal. I was perplexed and the CS agent didn't understand why either.

I Googled "JPMC". It told me it stood for JP Morgan Chase. OK, I thought. I have a Chase card (which I applied for to use on holiday), but I have never paid them anything, least of all by Paypal. And in any case, the card was recently applied for.

Next I thought I would ring Maureen at Paypal and all would be explained. Wrong. Dialled that 01202 number and I got instantly cut off. Tried it three times in case it was glitch with my mobile.

Then I googled her name and the phone number, which threw up several messages in fora suggesting it was a scam.

I was a bit thrown by this, so I had a think what the payment might be for. I knew Netflix were taking money every month, but that amount didn't ring a bell. I didn't want to cancel it until I was sure it was a scam.

I tried to log into my Paypal account but it was down. So I logged into my Netflix account and rang them. They told me that I had been a member since August 2014 and that my latest payments had increased to match the amount I had queried with my bank. But I still wasn't sure that it was a kosher payment.

I rang the bank again to ask if they could flit back through my statements to cross-reference all the amounts (the Netflix fees had increased over the years, so if the amounts on my statements had done so at the same time, I could be sure it was a kosher payment to Netflix). Turned out I had to do it via my banking app, so I checked some at random and they matched.

Finally, later in the day I was able to access my Paypal account and could see the amount was for Netflix.

The reason I have posted this thread is to try and help others who may, as I did, Google that name and number and, as I did, come across all the suggestions that it is a scam.

There are still some out there who are convinced they have been scammed and have cancelled the DD and demanded refunds from their banks and no doubt some of these are scams. But I think some of them may be genuine payments.

It doesn't help that the only payment reference is to Paypal, not to the company product or service you are paying.
It doesn't help that JPMC means nothing to most people, nor that Maureen has a contact number that refuses to accept your call.

And it doesn't help that if you want to set up a DD, all you need in many cases is a sort code and account number.

The DD guarantee will refund any unauthorised payment, but I'm not sure that will cover small regular payments that have been going out for months or years that can be easily missed if you are not vigilant.

I hope this helps people!
 
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Queried a payment with my bank which I was unsure about.

I opened an online chat and was told the originator was JPMC Re Paypal. There was also a Bournemouth address and phone number.

JPMC meant absolutely nothing to me. I asked if there was a company name (aside from Paypal) or product or service associated with this payment. I was told that was all the information they had.

So I rang CS and they investigated. I was told that because it was a Paypal payment, I would be better talking to Paypal. They told me they had a contact name and number for Paypal: Maureen Whitmarsh and an 01202 number. They told me these payments had been going out of our account since March 2016, one month after we opened it.

I queried the fact that in my list of DDs (in my banking app), there were two entries mentioning "Paypal". One that said "Paypal Payment" and another that said "JPMC Re Paypal".
I was expecting the second entry to have the payment I was questioning listed under it, as it matched exactly the originator of that payment.

But to my surprise, there were no payments listed under "JPMC Re Paypal" DD entry. The amount in question was listed under "Paypal Payment", along with other things I recognised that I had paid for using Paypal. I was perplexed and the CS agent didn't understand why either.

I Googled "JPMC". It told me it stood for JP Morgan Chase. OK, I thought. I have a Chase card (which I applied for to use on holiday), but I have never paid them anything, least of all by Paypal. And in any case, the card was recently applied for.

Next I thought I would ring Maureen at Paypal and all would be explained. Wrong. Dialled that 01202 number and I got instantly cut off. Tried it three times in case it was glitch with my mobile.

Then I googled her name and the phone number, which threw up several messages in fora suggesting it was a scam.

I was a bit thrown by this, so I had a think what the payment might be for. I knew Netflix were taking money every month, but that amount didn't ring a bell. I didn't want to cancel it until I was sure it was a scam.

I tried to log into my Paypal account but it was down. So I logged into my Netflix account and rang them. They told me that I had been a member since August 2014 and that my latest payments had increased to match the amount I had queried with my bank. But I still wasn't sure that it was a kosher payment.

I rang the bank again to ask if they could flit back through my statements to cross-reference all the amounts (the Netflix fees had increased over the years, so if the amounts on my statements had done so at the same time, I could be sure it was a kosher payment to Netflix). Turned out I had to do it via my banking app, so I checked some at random and they matched.

Finally, later in the day I was able to access my Paypal account and could see the amount was for Netflix.

The reason I have posted this thread is to try and help others who may, as I did, Google that name and number and, as I did, come across all the suggestions that it is a scam.

There are still some out there who are convinced they have been scammed and have cancelled the DD and demanded refunds from their banks and no doubt some of these are scams. But I think some of them may be genuine payments.

It doesn't help that the only payment reference is to Paypal, not to the company product or service you are paying.
It doesn't help that JPMC means nothing to most people, nor that Maureen has a contact number that refuses to accept your call.

And it doesn't help that if you want to set up a DD, all you need in many cases is a sort code and account number.

The DD guarantee will refund any unauthorised payment, but I'm not sure that will cover small regular payments that have been going out for months or years that can be easily missed if you are not vigilant.

I hope this helps people!
What seems strange to me (if I'm reading your post correctly) is the use of a first name in these transactions, in this case Maureen. Surely it should just be named something like Netflix account? Use of first names should be reserved for personal transactions and the like.
 
Yeah. I'm not sure that the person is attached as it were to the transaction. But certainly my bank gave me that name and number as a Paypal contact.

And therein lies the issue. Paypal use "Paypal" as the reference because you are using their service. There is no option of adding further details, according to Paypal.

I'm sure there is, but that's what they tell me.
 
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And it doesn't help that if you want to set up a DD, all you need in many cases is a sort code and account number.

The DD guarantee will refund any unauthorised payment, but I'm not sure that will cover small regular payments that have been going out for months or years that can be easily missed if you are not vigilant.

Me too! Not quite the same, though similar. Google Ireland, or someone, managed somehow to set up what seemed to be a DD against my Paypal account on 1st Jan this year. From what I could make out, it was something to do with advertising and promoting Karting of all things - certainly not something I would have anything to do with. I spotted it straight away.

Disputed it with Paypal, Paypal claimed they had been provided with proof of delivery, so case closed - go chase Google, but there were no contact details in the dd for Google. I had PP, send me the email contact address, to ask Google for an explanation and a refund.

In the meantime, I have rung the bank and asked them to claw the payment back.

If you can log into Paypal, it lists who has been paid, the amount and when.

I run an App on my PC, which watches all of my accounts, flagging up anything unusual, or out of the ordinary.
 
Yeah, part of the problem here is that I was delayed in getting access to my PP account.

Don't forget to ask your bank to cancel the DD and refund all charges (this next bit is the important bit) under the Direct Debit Guarantee.
 
Don't forget to ask your bank to cancel the DD and refund all charges (this next bit is the important bit) under the Direct Debit Guarantee.

It was refunded by my bank, back in my account, within 24 hours of my phone call to the bank. There were no other charges or loss involved.
 
This exact same things has happened to me, I have been having several (up to 6 or 7) Direct Debits coming out of my account a month with the reference of Maureen Whitmarsh JPMC. The number they gave me was a Bournemouth number and it does not work. These amounts were all for different sums of money from 79p - £56. I can't identify the payments and have disputed this with the bank. PayPal did not want to get involved at all.

From your original post I couldn't establish whether yours was a scam or not? I pay my Netflix DD via PayPal, but that's just once a month and not for loads of different amounts. Apparently this has been happening since 2017 and I haven't noticed! I'm terrified I won'g get this money back as over the last few months it's escalated to hundreds of pounds.

Did anyone end up getting the money back??
 
It was refunded by my bank, back in my account, within 24 hours of my phone call to the bank. There were no other charges or loss involved.

Paypal have responded by restricting my account, following the claw back by my bank. Google Ads have at last responded to suggest they are looking into my complaint - whatever Google Ads might be, and I was not able to track any information about it down.
 
This exact same things has happened to me, I have been having several (up to 6 or 7) Direct Debits coming out of my account a month with the reference of Maureen Whitmarsh JPMC. The number they gave me was a Bournemouth number and it does not work. These amounts were all for different sums of money from 79p - £56. I can't identify the payments and have disputed this with the bank. PayPal did not want to get involved at all.

From your original post I couldn't establish whether yours was a scam or not? I pay my Netflix DD via PayPal, but that's just once a month and not for loads of different amounts. Apparently this has been happening since 2017 and I haven't noticed! I'm terrified I won'g get this money back as over the last few months it's escalated to hundreds of pounds.

Did anyone end up getting the money back??
I did mention it above, but I'll clarify it here.

In my case, the payments were legit for Netflix services.

The phone number is for a Chase Bank call centre and I think Maureen is PayPal's contact there. I don't know how this information was available to my bank, though!
 
and just to update....

I am still in dispute with Paypal, with regard to them making a payment to Google Ads., and I have not heard any more about it since I had my bank claw back the payment.
 
Yeah, part of the problem here is that I was delayed in getting access to my PP account.

Don't forget to ask your bank to cancel the DD and refund all charges (this next bit is the important bit) under the Direct Debit Guarantee.

Banks however cannot always claw back money under the Direct Debit Guarantee.

Years ago, I made the mistake of taking out phone insurance with Fonesafe (CPC). I lost my phone in Latvia in the early hours of Sunday morning, shortly before flying back to London.

I put in a claim and they refused to honour it because I didn't have a Latvian crime number. Months later, I noticed that they were still charging me £9pm for a phone that they knew that I no longer had. The contract was a rolling contract. I asked my bank to cancel the DD and to refund the most recent payment. The bank operative tried and failed to do so. Somehow, CPC managed to block attempts to cancel the DD and raise refunds.
 
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