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My account has been disabled again over suspicious purchases I didn’t make

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I’m not posting this because I need instructions on what to do. I have already contacted Adobe by email about this new suspension, and I am waiting for a response.

This has happened before. The first time, I sent countless emails and posted on this forum. People said they wanted to help, but nothing actually helped resolve the situation. I still had to wait about a month for Adobe to investigate, and I was the one who suffered the consequences. I lost access to my portfolio and income during one of my most important sales periods, at the beginning of September, including around September 7.

My account was eventually restored. I was able to work and receive earnings for about a month. Now, on October 16, it has been disabled again over suspicious purchases made by someone I do not know. I did not make or authorize those purchases.

I had more than US$300 in my account that I was counting on receiving. Now I may have to wait another month, risk having my earnings adjusted, and lose another month of income — assuming my account is restored again.

I am not asking the forum to explain the process or tell me to contact support. I have already done that. I am asking a different question: Is this going to happen to my account every month? Will it work for one month and then be disabled for another because of purchases made by people who are not me?

I cannot control who tries to buy my work. Yet every time this happens, I lose access to my portfolio and income while the investigation takes place. Adobe restored my account after the last investigation, but now the same thing has happened again. What am I supposed to expect — one month working and one month without income, over and over?

I’m angry and exhausted. I should not have to keep losing work and money because of suspicious activity by other people. I want Adobe to address the actual issue and explain whether contributors can expect this to keep happening.

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Madeleine2182

Inspiring

I feel your pain, I’m now on my 3rd suspension. They are happening almost back to back, my account is only live for 2-3 weeks max before it’s suspended again for exactly the same reason. I’ve lost out on 14 weeks of Adobe income this year because of this and am rapidly running out of patience that they will implement some sort of permanent fix to the problem.

I have no suggestions to make only to sympathise with how angry, frustrated and exhausted you are.

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Cosmic Studio

Inspiring

@Madeleine2182, is it taking a bit longer to get a response this time? 😞 Do you happen to remember if all the suspensions occurred after you requested the payout?

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Madeleine2182

Inspiring

It’s been around 4 weeks so far which is the earliest I’ve ever heard back. The payout request always triggers the suspension but it takes around 4-5 days after the request for it to happen.

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daniellei4510

Community Expert

I wish we could be of more help, since a number of contributors of late have been dealing with their accounts being disabled, restored, and then disabled again. This was a rare occurrence during my first four years as an Adobe Stock contributor. It hasn’t happened to me (yet), but this is why I withdraw payments as soon as my account reaches the $30-$35 mark. If it ever does happen, I don’t want it to occur when I have a few hundred (or even over a thousand, as happened to one contributor). It would certainly be helpful if Adobe could be more transparent as to what exactly causes these bans beyond “suspicious activity” at the very least, even if it’s something neither we nor Adobe has control over.

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Adobe Community Expert | I have miles to go before I sleep, but I'm all done on this end.

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Madeleine2182

Inspiring

The really frustrating thing is I’ve always hit the withdraw button as soon as I hit the same level you do for as long as I’ve had my account. But the withdrawal request seems to be the trigger for suspensions so you’re left wondering whether to leave the money there for a while to see if credit card fraud is picked up on. It doesn’t help that you can’t choose how much to withdraw, it’s all or nothing.

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Family32113662be3d

Participant

I'm very sorry to hear that your account has been disabled again. I'm currently experiencing a similar situation with an unusual number of downloads on my Adobe Stock account, so your experience is particularly concerning to me.

May I ask you two questions?

Did you report the suspicious purchases to Adobe Support before your account was disabled, or did the suspension happen without any prior warning?
Did you request a payout shortly before either of the two suspensions, or were your accounts disabled without any payout requests?

I have already reported my unusual downloads to Adobe twice, but both support cases were closed with generic responses stating that my account would be reviewed.

I'm trying to understand what precautions contributors can take to protect their accounts from suspicious purchases they have no control over.

Thank you for sharing your experience. I really hope your account gets restored soon

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marcelof9181570Author

Participant

Thanks for asking. I didn’t contact Adobe about the downloads before my account was disabled because I didn’t think they were suspicious. I had a large number of sales last week, but they were several videos from the same collection, which I filmed during a trip. It seemed completely reasonable to me that someone who needed footage from that location for a project would buy several clips from the collection.

I had requested a US$200 payout, which I expected to receive this Sunday, October 18, and I also had about US$110 more in my account.

I’m not especially worried that Adobe will permanently disable my account, because this happened to me once before. That time, it took about a month for my account to be restored. Adobe deducted the amounts from the suspicious purchases, paid me what I had legitimately earned, and my account started working again.

The problem is that it has happened again, and I may now have to go another month without receiving any income while Adobe investigates which purchases it considers suspicious. Contributors have no control over who buys our work or how they use it. Adobe should be able to detect and review suspicious transactions quickly or at least provide a real support channel where contributors can get meaningful answers. In my experience, you can be left waiting for a month with no clear information.

I’m sharing this mainly to document what happened and to let you know that, based on my previous experience, your account may be restored too. My concern is that this has happened to me again so soon, and that contributors may lose access to their work and income for weeks while waiting for another investigation.

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Family32113662be3d

Participant

Thank you so much for taking the time to share your experience in such detail. I really appreciate it, especially given what you're going through right now.

It's reassuring to know that Adobe restored your account previously and paid out your legitimate earnings, although it's very frustrating that you're having to deal with the same situation again.

I completely agree that contributors shouldn't have to risk losing access to their accounts and income because of purchases they have absolutely no control over.

I sincerely hope your account is restored quickly this time, without another month of waiting. Wishing you all the best!

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