By KathyNandita
Hello everyone,
I recently created a new DigitalOcean account using GitHub authentication and connected my PayPal account for billing verification. During verification, PayPal was charged $5 successfully. After that, I activated my GitHub Student Developer Pack benefits and my account now shows $205 in DigitalOcean credits.
However, I cannot use the platform normally.
Whenever I try to:
- create a new Droplet
- use Launchpad
- deploy resources
I receive the following error message:
“Looks like something went wrong… If this keeps happening, check out status.digitalocean.com”
Here are the things I already tried:
- logging out and back in
- incognito/private browser mode
- different browser
- different Droplet regions
- refreshing the dashboard
- checking DigitalOcean status page
The problem still continues.
I also noticed that the $5 PayPal verification charge has not yet been refunded/reversed, although the credits were added successfully.
Additionally, after some time, my account was redirected to an Account Activation Request / manual review ticket page, so I think my account may have been temporarily restricted or flagged for verification.
My intended usage is completely legitimate and educational:
- learning Linux/cloud infrastructure
- hosting personal/student projects
- backend APIs
- small databases
- development/testing environments
Has anyone experienced this before with new accounts or GitHub Student Pack credits?
How long does manual review usually take, and is there anything else I should do while waiting for support?
Thank you.
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Hi there,
This looks like your account got flagged for manual review during the verification process, which is not uncommon on new accounts, especially when PayPal is used for billing verification. The “something went wrong” error and the Account Activation Request page you mentioned both point to this.
There is not much you can do from your end while the review is pending. The best move is to reply to the activation ticket you already have open and briefly explain your intended use, which you have already done here, so just paste something similar. That helps the team process it faster.
Manual reviews on new accounts are usually resolved within a few business days. If you have a ticket id alrady, share it here.
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