Peer-to-peer payment apps such as Zelle, Venmo and Cash App are easy to use. But what if you send money to the wrong person – or if someone you don’t know sends money and asks for it back?
Of people who use peer-to-peer payment services at least once per week, 12% have sent money to the wrong person, a recent survey by Consumer Reports found.
One Zelle user meant to pay a travel agent $150 as a deposit for an upcoming trip. But the phone number she entered was off by one digit and the money went to the wrong person.
The user, whose name is Roliette, called the person she accidentally sent the money to and asked them to send it back.
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“I said, ‘Listen, back in July, I, you know, realized that I sent you $150, and I'm just calling to find out if I could get that money back.' And then the phone went dead,” she said.
Roliette tried calling again but it went straight to voicemail every time.
She contacted her bank for help and they contacted Zelle. They sent her an email saying they were unable to retrieve the funds. They offered no explanation and closed the investigation.
Kimberly Palmer, a finance expert with NerdWallet, says there could be an honest explanation for why the person who wrongfully received Roliette’s money was skeptical about returning it.
“It is entirely possible that the person she called thought that she was a scammer,” Palmer said.
Scam alert: What to know if a stranger sends you money and asks for it back
There’s a scam going around in which a fraudster claims to have accidentally sent money to your payment app and then asks you to return it. The problem is, the money they sent you may have come from a stolen credit card or hacked account.
If you send the money back to the scammer, you could personally be on the hook for the money once the transaction is flagged as fraudulent.
“You have to be really careful. Anytime someone sends you money, you don't want to just send it back because they asked you to,” Palmer said.
Zelle told News4 that if you get money sent to your account by mistake, don’t send it back to the sender unless you know them. Instead, they say to contact your bank, which may be able to help you return the payment.
Venmo said to contact their support team, which can help reverse the payment.
Cash App asks customers to use the Refund feature to send the payment back, without creating a new payment.
Here are two more tips: treat these transactions like cash, because they are, and send a small amount of money as a test first and get confirmation that it was received.
Roliette, who accidentally sent money to the wrong person, said she’ll be more careful in the future.
“Everything happens for a reason, and so every situation is a lesson learned,” she said.
