It's probably not. Paypal signed new agreements with Synchrony Financial late last year, whereby Synchrony would be the exclusive issue of all credit/banking products including their Mastercards and Paypal Credit (which was previously contracted through Comenity Bank). If you've ever had an account through either of these products, active or inactive, its possible this check derives from or may be possible related to something of that nature. Other than that, the only 2 other possibilities I can think of would be the following:
In or around 2015, Paypal resolved lawsuits and US CFPB investigations into their Paypal Credit product by arriving at an agreed settlement amount. I'm not sure what the process was to submit a claim if you were impacted by Paypal's alleged behavior regarding the credit product, perhaps there was a claim's administrator, I don't know. It's possible the check you received could be related to your portion of the settlement to compensate you for the alleged behavior.
Or, perhaps you sold something to someone and they used Paypal to send an e-check? Not sure as I know nothing about e-checks, but its not implausible, so I offer it as a potential possibility.
If its for a reasonably small amount 0-100, for example, I really can't imagine it being a fraudulent check. After all, all those scams they talk about in the News where people deposited bogus checks and wired the money out to the fraudsters did not receive the checks in question until regular communication with the fraudster was established. If its significantly more than what I highlighted above, I'd take it to Bank of America (as the Bank of Record AKA Originating Financial Institution) and ask them to take a look at it if Paypal Customer Care does not yield the information you want or need.
Paypal won't permit me (the system has already autorejected my post twice) to reveal the phone number. Google paypal customer care phone number and look for the last 4 digits 1161. That's all I can say since my post is getting flagged for this reason.
Follow the Phone prompts as punching 0 doesn't work and the system can hang up on you if you try too many times. They are pretty nice and some reps can be more helpful than others. Morning to Early Afternoon will likely connect you with a rep who is US based. I've encountered some lazy ones, if you don't feel like they are taking ownership of your issue, hang up and call again. You will get a different rep. Evening and Night calls - in my experience - are routed to reps OCONUS (outside continental United States) and you can usually tell from cultural accents. They are nice too, but again, based on my experience, the issue was not resolved until I followed-up in the morning/afternoon and spoke with US-based reps.
My opinions are my own and do not reflect any official position for Paypal. All suggestions are based on my education, experience, and interactions in matters of finance over the years.
Good luck!
