Fraudulent Google Play Transactions

[literallyJoel]

My phone was stolen on Saturday March 5th, and over the next 10 minutes or so they racked up £239.51 of charges over 19 Google Play transactions. They were not made on my own Google account. I went into an EE store to get a replacement SIM on the Monday and told them that my phone had been stolen. I did not discover the charges until today when my bank notified me of the upcoming direct debit. 

I have tried contacting Google Support and they directed me to a form to report these transactions, but they require a Correlation ID. I cannot find any information on this and all the support agent would tell me is "Your carrier will provide this". Any help either getting the Correlation ID or disputing these charges with EE would be much appreciated. 

[Lychee]

I see, thank you!

And also thank you @Jacko1805 🙂

So far my experience with EE has been great, even in this case the guide has been lovely, very kind and empathetic and doing everything she can to help, so I think I'll personally be sticking with them for now - I do agree that Google should be ashamed though!

[Finnd99]

Hello,

I have had the same situation. My Phone bill for April came to £250+ because of third party transactions. I have been emailing Google for over a month now and they are adamant i need a Correlation ID which EE are equally as adamant they do not supply. Please can i get some help on how to obtain this?

Cheers

Finn

[Leanne_T]

Hi @Finnd99 

Have you tried the steps in the solution on this thread Solved: Re: Fraudulent Google Play Transactions - Page 2 - The EE Community?

Leanne 🙂

[AngelO88]

Go to a company called boku. They will provide you with this information. Ee are wrong and not very supportive at all to their customers. I am in the same position £239.95 worth of google charges. Ee washed their hands off of the problem from the very beginning. 
They deliberately directed me to the ombudsman knowing that the ombudsman would not do anything and once the ombudsman back EE, EE use that to their advantage saying that they don’t have to offer any remedy. I contacted action fraud who work along side the police they and the police said that EE are liable wipe the bill, I contacted google who said EE are liable for the charges but still EE wont do anything about it.

[hn24]

Hi @literallyJoel! Not sure if you will see this since this is over 2 years old but worth a try! 

Same situation here with my phone stolen and didn't know that the thief attached my mobile number to their Google Play Account (don't use anything Google Play services myself). Also didn't know you can pay with your mobile number. 

I followed your advice (Thanks so much, much more helpful than EE and A LOT better than Google - Google is hopeless, no phone number and when I contacted them, they say they will forward my case to the relevant team and heard nothing still...). Anyway, I contacted Boku twice (over 2 weeks now) and I have yet to heard anything from them... and from their reviews it seems they don't reply! How long did your process take and any tips and advice? 

Thanks! 

H

[Jacko1805]

Hi All

Just thought I'd mention that we follow everything Literallyjoel said and we stopped the further payments , however over £700 was stolen, no one was interested, we spent hours on the phone to EE, Boku, Google all where useless!!!!! In the end we went to the BBC, ITV, Ch4, Ch5 and told all the scam shows what had happened , it was only after one of those programmes showed interest and started following up our case that we got our money back!!!!! This situation is rife and the big phone companies need to stamp it out now and stop ignoring their customers!!!!

[literallyJoel]

Hiya,

I never actually contacted Boku directly - I logged into Boku here https://customer.boku.com/login (it's all done through your phone so you just have to request a PIN code and you should be able to login). From there I grabbed the correlation IDs for the fraudulent transactions, and then dealt with Google from thereon out. If Google aren't being co-operative, I'd recommend contacting them via this specific form: https://support.google.com/googlepay/contact/complaint and in your message make it clear to them that if they do not get it resolved you'll be escalating to the financial ombudsmen. They got it sorted fairly quickly after I did that. 

[hn24]

Hi @Jacko1805 !

Sorry to hear that you went through what I am going through now! Literally I have been trying to get hold of Boku, but literally no replies after submitting the forms because I can't view more transactions... 

This is crazy and what I am scared of as they still have my mobile phone connected to their Google Play account... How did you contact all the broadcasting networks like BBC and ITV etc! 

I am worried that I will not get my money back, luckily I have stopped all the direct debit for now but obviously they are still connected to my account... 

[hn24]

Hi @literallyJoel 

Thanks for your reply! Good to hear from you and thanks for your advice again! I finally managed to connect to a Google agent via email after 1 live chat and 2 phone calls saying they would forward my case to the Google Play Team. 

I see thanks for the confirmation. I need to access the previous transaction history on Boku because they have made over 100+ fraudulent transaction and the website only list the most recent 100... 

[Jacko1805]

Hi there
You have to put Ur mob number into the search engine on the Boku site, then
all the transactions and attempted ones will drop down, there is an option
at the top to block your number and then that will stop any further
payments to Google!