A charge from FACEBK on your statement

FACEBK followed by ten letters and numbers is Meta, the company that owns Facebook and Instagram, charging a card for advertising. Meta says every ad transaction has "a unique 10-character reference number", and that the statement line "begins with "FACEBK*" or "FACEBOOK INC." followed by your 10 character reference number".¹ A few FACEBK lines are not ads: in the public card records below, a Meta Verified subscription was billed as FACEBK *META VERIFIED.⁷

What it looks like on a real statement

The State of Delaware publishes every purchase its employees make on state cards, with the merchant name as the bank received it. When we counted on 12 October 2026 it had 4,293 lines starting with FACEBK, from July 2014 to September 2026, almost all of them filed as advertising.⁷ They do not all look the way Meta’s page says.

For eight years most lines had no star at all: from 2017 to 2023, 2,532 of 2,743 FACEBK lines were written FACEBK, a space and the code.⁷ Not one ad line in the records starts FACEBOOK INC. with a code. If you are searching your online banking for the text Meta gives, search for the ten characters alone.

The ten characters after FACEBK

In Delaware’s records the code is never reused on another day: 3,921 different codes, and each one appears on a single date. Several lines on the same day can share a code.⁷ We read those as one charge that the state split across its own budget lines; the records do not say.

The codes use the digits 2 to 9 and every letter except I and O. None of the codes we found has a 0, 1, I or O, so if yours seems to, read it again. Every code before 13 June 2026 ends in 2; since then 37 of the 92 coded lines end in 4 instead.⁷ Meta’s help pages that we read do not explain the code beyond calling it a reference number. Meta also says your statement "may not show the full 10-character reference number", in which case it tells you to ask your bank for it.¹

Why it can charge after the ads stopped

Meta does not charge for an ad when you create it. Ad costs build up and are charged when they reach the account’s payment threshold, and again on a monthly bill date for whatever is left.⁵ In Meta’s words, "you may be charged multiple times in a month or even after your ads stop running".⁵ Meta skips the monthly charge if what is owed is under $1.00.⁵

Two charges of the same amount on one day, Meta says, are likely for clicks on different days, with one delayed by the bank. Clicks and views that reach Meta late, up to 48 hours, go on the next bill.⁴ A small recent charge is "likely a temporary authorization" to check the card, which Meta says it voids at once and which should go within 3 to 5 business days.¹

The most common amounts in Delaware’s records are round numbers, $50.00 (438 lines), $25.00 (178), $2.00 (167) and $100.00 (145).⁷

Meta Verified: one subscription under six names

Meta Verified is a paid monthly subscription for a verified badge. When Meta launched it in 2023 it cost $11.99 a month bought on the web and $14.99 bought on iPhone or Android.⁸ One office in Delaware’s legislature paid $11.99 on or around the 28th of every month from November 2023 to August 2026: 34 charges and one refund. Over those months the bank received six different names:⁷

That these are one subscription is our reading: same office, same amount, same day of the month, no gap. The records do not name the product after November 2025. What it shows is that a Meta Verified charge can look like an ad charge, with a ten-character code and no product name, and that a statement line you have never seen before can be a subscription you have had for years.

How to find an ad charge and stop it

1. Copy the code from the statement Take the ten characters after FACEBK, or ask your bank for them if the line is cut short.¹
2. Search it in Meta Ads Manager On a computer, open Billing & payments, pick the ad account if you have more than one, then Payment activity, Reference number, and enter the code. The receipt shows how much, when, which payment method and which ads it paid for.²³ Meta says this only works on a computer, and you need full control or admin rights on the ad account.²
3. Check every ad account and everyone on it Meta’s page on activity you do not recognise says to check who has access under Ad account roles, because someone sharing your card or account may have run a separate ad. A boosted post counts too: it is charged as it runs, not when you boost it.³
4. Stop future charges Turn off the ads. Costs already built up are still charged on the next bill date or when they reach the threshold, whichever comes first.⁵
5. If the account was taken over Meta says that when it sees suspicious activity it may remove admins, pause ads or change payment methods, and asks you to tell it if you think the ad account was hacked.³ Its billing contact form asks you to log in to Facebook first: when we opened it on 12 October 2026 without an account, it showed only the login page.⁹
6. If you have no Facebook ad account at all, go to your bank Every Meta billing page we read starts from an ad account. If you have none, tell your card issuer you want to dispute the charge, bring the statement line exactly as printed with every date and amount, and ask for a new card. Ask what its deadline for disputes is; it depends on the bank, the card network and the reason.

How to cancel Meta Verified

Meta’s help page says you have to cancel where you signed up: "If you purchased directly through Meta on a computer, cancel your subscription on a computer. You can’t cancel a subscription purchased directly through Meta on a mobile device." A subscription bought through Apple is cancelled in the Instagram or Facebook app on an iPhone or iPad; one bought through Google, in Google Play.⁶

• Cancel at least 24 hours before the next payment date, or you are charged for another month.⁶
• "Meta does not offer any credits or partial refunds for canceled Meta Verified subscriptions."⁶
• "Signing out of your account or deleting the Instagram or Facebook apps won’t cancel your subscription."⁶

If it was bought on an iPhone, the charge is on your statement as APPLE.COM/BILL; on Android, as GOOGLE *.

What a refund looks like

An ad refund carries the same code as the charge it reverses. Delaware’s records have 39 refund lines with a code, and every one matches the code of an earlier charge. 25 of them came within 14 days of the charge; the longest took 166 days.⁷ If you are waiting for money back, search for the code you were charged with and look for a minus amount.

Is it a scam?

A FACEBK line is a charge from Meta. But Meta charges whichever card is on an ad account, and the person running the ads does not have to be the card holder. If the code does not match any ad account you can get into, treat it as unauthorized: call your bank and ask for a new card.

Other names

Google’s ads are GOOGLE *ADS. LinkedIn’s ads, Premium subscriptions and job posts are LINKEDIN, with a number that is new on every charge. Other names are in the table of statement names.

Sources

1. Meta Business Help Center, "Find your Meta ad charges on your credit card statement". facebook.com/business/help. Read in a browser on 12 October 2026. Archived copy of 12 October 2026.
2. Meta Business Help Center, "View and download receipts for your Meta ad charges". facebook.com/business/help. Read in a browser on 12 October 2026. The web archive did not keep a copy when we asked on 12 October 2026.
3. Meta Business Help Center, "Troubleshoot unrecognized activity on your ad account". facebook.com/business/help. Read in a browser on 12 October 2026. Archived copy of 12 October 2026.
4. Meta Business Help Center, "Why did I get charged twice for my Facebook ad?". facebook.com/business/help. Read in a browser on 12 October 2026. Archived copy of 12 October 2026.
5. Meta Business Help Center, "When Meta charges you for ads". facebook.com/business/help. Read in a browser on 12 October 2026. The web archive did not keep a copy when we asked on 12 October 2026.
6. Instagram Help Center, "Cancel your Meta Verified creator subscription". help.instagram.com. Read in a browser on 12 October 2026. Archived copy of 12 October 2026.
7. State of Delaware Open Data, State Employee Credit Card Transactions, fields "merchant", "trans_dt", "merchandise_amt", "dept_name" and "div_name". Lines containing FACEBK; lines starting FACEBOOK; lines starting METAPAY. Queried and counted on 12 October 2026.
8. Meta, "Testing Meta Verified to Help Creators Establish Their Presence", 19 February 2023. about.fb.com. Read on 12 October 2026. Archived copy of 12 October 2026.
9. Facebook Help Center, billing contact form linked from "Why did I get charged twice for my Facebook ad?". facebook.com/help/contact. Opened without logging in on 12 October 2026.