The promise was spectacular: to give his followers his own bank card details so they could make purchases with his money. But the operation launched by influencer Benoît Chevalier quickly turned into a fiasco. Behind the perfectly calibrated scheme designed to build anticipation on social media, many users are now telling a very different story: declined payments, orders validated then canceled, and, for some, Amazon accounts suspended after trying to use the coveted card.
In the comments, the word "scam" is now appearing regularly. This is an accusation made by internet users, not an established legal definition. But the accounts are numerous and similar enough to raise a simple question: what did Benoît Chevalier actually offer his community?
A bank card transformed into an audience-generating machine
Benoît Chevalier didn't just immediately publish his card information. The influencer built anticipation around its release, notably directing his community to his stories. The strategy was incredibly effective: thousands of followers waited for the details, refreshed the posts, and rushed to place orders as soon as they appeared. Some even prepared shopping carts worth several hundred euros. One user explained that he had prepared around €300 worth of groceries per person for several family members. For a few minutes, the operation seemed to work. Then the cancellations began. "Barely five minutes later, everything was canceled ," this user recounted. A mother stated, "My daughters' orders were confirmed and then canceled." Another bluntly summarized, "My entire cart was canceled." And similar accounts continued to pile up.
Orders are placed… before being cancelled
This is precisely what fuels the anger: several internet users aren't simply reporting that their card was declined. They claim to have seen their order accepted , only to have it ultimately canceled. "I had succeeded, but it marked everything as canceled ," writes one user. Another recounts: "I couldn't order; it validated it for nothing, then canceled it immediately."
One internet user explained that he thought he could treat his entire family to gift baskets worth nearly €300, only to see the entire order vanish a few minutes later. The influencer's promise of purchases paid for by the influencer has thus given way, for a portion of his community, to a series of phantom orders.
The worst part for some: Amazon blocks their account
For several subscribers, the story doesn't end with a canceled order. They claim their Amazon account was suspended after attempting to pay with the card provided by Benoît Chevalier. " My Amazon account was suspended for 'unusual payment,'" one user recounts. Another writes: "My Amazon account has just been blocked for suspicious payment."
The same scenario plays out elsewhere: "I was lucky enough to get your card, but it blocked my Amazon account. How am I supposed to place my orders now?" One internet user even claims to find herself in a particularly absurd situation: "My Amazon account is blocked; I need Benoît Chevalier's proof of address for account security."
In other words, some subscribers who came looking for a few dozen or hundreds of euros in free purchases report having found their own Amazon account blocked.
"I lost 500 bucks": an internet user recounts his misadventure
Among the comments, one account goes even further. A user claims that his Amazon account was banned even though he had also placed an order using his own credit card. "My Amazon account was banned, I ordered a TV with my card and the order was canceled and there was no refund, I lost 500 bucks ," he wrote.
"A huge scam, just for the buzz."
Anger immediately erupted in response to Benoît Chevalier's posts. "Fake post, payments aren't going through... a huge scam just for the buzz ," accused one internet user. Another wrote: "That's really not right, giving us false hope for nothing, the card isn't working or at least he's blocking the payments." A third directly accused him: " Scam! My daughters' orders were validated then canceled, and meanwhile this guy is getting a crazy amount of attention."
Some are announcing their intention to report her accounts. Others are talking about "fraud" or "fake news." One of the most revealing comments directly targets the audience-building mechanics: "If you really wanted to post it for your community, you would have posted it on Instagram and that's it (...) it's a way to gain traffic to your Snap stories."
This is precisely where the controversy becomes embarrassing for Benoît Chevalier: while internet users are chasing after information from his map, each of their visits mechanically feeds the statistics of his various accounts.
Some even accuse him of having given out fake codes
The accusations are becoming even more serious. "He's inventing the codes for the card on the Insta story ," claims one internet user.
Subscribers who naively took the promise literally thought they could use the money made available to them, but some find themselves with a cancelled order or a blocked account.
Behind the "gift" lies a huge PR stunt
One thing is certain: the promotion generated a huge amount of activity around Benoît Chevalier's social media accounts. To have any hope of getting the card, users had to follow his posts, watch his stories, and act within seconds. The influencer thus found himself at the center of a digital race potentially involving hundreds of thousands of people. A massive buzz-generating campaign that preyed on the naivety of internet users. Some ended up with more than just disappointment: they claim to have lost access to their Amazon accounts.
"Scam," "lie," "false hopes": subscribers turn against Benoît Chevalier
The publicity stunt is backfiring on Benoît Chevalier. The word "scam" is now appearing repeatedly under his own posts. And internet users are no longer simply criticizing him for a card that stopped working too quickly: some are openly accusing him of having dangled the promise of free money before his followers to trigger a rush on his stories and artificially inflate his audience.
“Fake post, payments don’t go through… a huge scam just for the buzz ,” accuses one internet user. A mother, for her part, asserts: “Scam! My daughters’ orders were validated then canceled, and meanwhile the guy is getting a crazy amount of buzz based on lies.” Another denounces “false hopes” and announces her intention to report the post. Even more embarrassing for the influencer, several accounts describe the exact same scenario: followers obtain card information, place orders, sometimes see their cart validated… then everything is canceled. Some then claim that their Amazon account was blocked for “unusual payment” or “suspicious payment.” One of them even claims to have had their account suspended after attempting the scam.
From then on, the question posed by internet users became particularly troubling: Did Benoît Chevalier truly intend to let his community spend his money so freely, or was the spectacular promise of his credit card primarily a ploy to attract as many people as possible to his content? Even if it meant unscrupulously exploiting the trust and naivety of his community. The buzz worked, at least initially, but quickly turned into a PR disaster. Let's hope that all the "victims" have realized that it can be dangerous to trust just anyone…
