The package doesn't install the php library GeoIP.php, it only installs the .so library

[joseche]

the geoip.so library is installed correctly but the PHP code is not copied over in the include_path which makes the library useless

ProblemType: Bug
DistroRelease: Ubuntu 12.04
Package: php5-geoip 1.0.7-4
ProcVersionSignature: Ubuntu 3.5.0-23.35~precise1-generic 3.5.7.2
Uname: Linux 3.5.0-23-generic x86_64
ApportVersion: 2.0.1-0ubuntu17.3
Architecture: amd64
Date: Thu Jun 27 10:21:47 2013
InstallationMedia: Ubuntu-Server 12.04.2 LTS "Precise Pangolin" - Release amd64 (20130214)
MarkForUpload: True
ProcEnviron:
 TERM=xterm
 PATH=(custom, no user)
 LANG=en_US.UTF-8
 SHELL=/bin/bash
SourcePackage: php-geoip
UpgradeStatus: No upgrade log present (probably fresh install)

[Launchpad Janitor (janitor)]

Status changed to 'Confirmed' because the bug affects multiple users.

[Sergey B Kirpichev (skirpichev)]

Perhaps, you doesn't look to the package description at all. There is no GeoIP.php at all, please see the documentation of the perl extension:
http://www.php.net/manual/en/ref.geoip.php

Probably, you confused with some pure-PHP library, may be this:
https://github.com/maxmind/geoip-api-php