A WORD OF CAUTION FOR ANYONE ON EBAY WANTING TO ADVERTISE EXTERNALLY WITH PINTEREST!
Summary: iggsaustralianaandcurios shared their troubling experience with Pinterest's advertising service, which led to unauthorized charges on their debit card despite the account being allegedly cancelled and due to service issues with no advertising results. They had to escalate the issue with their bank to dispute charges and safeguard against potential unauthorized transactions, ultimately involving cyber fraud investigation. springyzone expressed concern about Pinterest's actions and suggested avoiding providing credit card details to them.
Having been encouraged by Ebay (Australia) to advertise externally on Pinterest a few months back, I took the opportunity to do so and this is when all the trouble started. I set up a paid account with this company back in April within the proviso, they advertise my Ebay seller site on their website. Within three weeks, I received my first invoice from this company for (wait for it) just over $50.00. Horrified as I had received on additional sales and nothing else for my money other than a few automated (A.I) generated emails, I quickly went into my account and cancelled it. I received an email confirmation, stating that my account had been cancelled and that within seven business days, it would be permanently closed (WRONG!) Almost a month later, I receive another invoice, taking my total charges to just under $63.00 (AUD) So, i go back onto Pinterest to definitely see if my account has been deactivated (as their automated email, stated it had) and the account AUTOMACTICALLY reactivates, sending me another email, telling me "WELCOME BACK TO PINTEREST, YOUR ACCOUNT WILL BE CHARGED FROM THIS DAY ONWARDS" So I cancel the account again. I then go into my Ebay seller metrics information, (I have a pro-seller account with Ebay) and look at the all the service metrics for external advertising, ONLY TO FIND, THAT PINTEREST HAVE PROVIDED ZERO ADVERTISING!!! NOT A SINGLE ADVERTISING CLICK BETWEEN PINTEREST AND MY EBAY ACCOUNT, OCCURED. I E-Mail Pinterest and after going through a series of online activities, that could rival a SLALOM WINTER OLYMPICS EVENTS, i finally get ONE SINGLE, E-Mail-Response. It states, hello blah, blah, I am Keith from Pinterest, and blah, blah, YOUR ACCOUNT CHARGES ARE BASED ON OUR PRO-RATA, REVERSE CHARGING METHODOLOGY?? (I don't work in finance, but basically i was charged, for charges, BEFORE i set up an account with this company and then charged, in advance, on top of being charged in reverse?) Yup, you work that one out, because my Bank certainly can't. I also get no response from Pinterest in regards why my visa debit card details, are still VALID on their invoices, despite their email telling me, that my account has been permanently deactivated? I contact Pinterest back by email asking them to please send me EVIDENCE of what they actually did for me for the last 90 days? I mean Physical sales evidence, graphs, screenshots, etc etc. I get this response. WHOOPS! WE DELETED THIS E-MAIL BECAUSE IT APPEARS, YOU HAVEN'T SPOKEN TO US FOR A WHILE?? (WT?) So to cut a long story short, i ended up disputing BOTH charges on my visa debit card with my bank and today (29/6/26) my bank rang me, stating that after 7 weeks, Pinterest have refused to contact them back (re a please explain?) so my fees are going to be reversed back into my card, in the next couple of days. (Yae!) Something good finally. However, my bank have raised further concerns and broached FICA (financial, industry Complaints Authority) re Pinterest's refusal to delete my card's details on their account system. (According to my bank, my card details are still valid, and can still be activated re further charges by this company.) My bank has responded by putting in a manual block and case notes, re making it impossible for Pinterest to take out any more money (And yes, it is illegal to refuse to shut down financial details from a deactivated account, but there you go.) Moral of this story.
springyzone
·3 months agoThat is truly terrible and well done on putting a stop to it.
It is all levels of wrong for a company to still be trying to deduct money from your account after you have cancelled plus emailed them.
I have to say, I am shocked. Pinterest is a well known company, I would not have thought it of them and will definitely steer clear of ever providing any credit card details to them in any capacity.
iggsaustralianaandcurios
OP3 months agoHi and thanks for your reply. You and me both. I quite liked going onto the Pinterest website in the past and looking at all the pins. Not anymore. It seems this particular company has done a complete 360 in so far as integrity and ethics are concerned. Do yourself a favor and go online and check out just how much negative feedback there is online re this particular business. It goes for pages and pages, which shocked even me (and I don't shock easily)
iggsaustralianaandcurios
OP3 months ago · EditedThis morning (1/7/2026) my bank rang me at 8.25am stating that Pinterest had again attempted to debit my visa card. (At around 2am in the morning) My bank's anti-fraud, cyber team, physically blocked the transaction and reversed the charges. My bank's anti-fraud, cyber team, is now in the process of completing a report to the Australian Federal Police, anti-cyber crime team, as they believe this to be a cyber attack on my account. I have checked my email account and no invoice has accompanied this transaction. I have now also phoned Ebay and spoken to their customer service team, about this issue and how this business actively promotes themselves to sellers as a THIRD PARTY PROVIDER WITH EBAY. THEY ARE NOT!!!
update, the charges attempted this morning have been reversed and Pinterest has now been reported to the Cyber Crime unit of SA Police.
davewil1964
·3 months agoSave the paragraph