Job Scams

The common Job Scams are targeted at people who are unemployed and desperately seeking job. Basically, there are no “real job” offered by the scammer, and their objective is to earn the initial, administrative fees from you. If you find that you need to “pay first” for whatever reasons to get a job, it is probably a scam. This has been confirmed by at least one of the UK embassy websites warning about similar matters.

Another form of Job Scams is the Money Mule, where you are offered a job to perform illegal money laundering. They promised a job that requires only a few hours/day, work at home and get a great pay. However, what you have been asked to do is basically to collect money from the scammer’s other victims (e.g. in lottery scams) and transfer the money to the scammer’s account. The Money Mule is discussed in more detail in one of our articles below.

While we try our best to include any instances and articles of job scams here, our collections are not exhaustive.

Here are some tips to spot a Job Scam:

1) You did not apply for the job, but you received an offer via email (or as spam).
We received many of such scam reports. Some of these offers came with detailed job description, while others are tend to keep it short and simple.

2) No experience or resume required.
This will sound too-good-to-be-true. You will be surprised why would anybody need your service when you have no experience, and that they are willing to pay a high price.

3) You are asked to receive a check, bank it, and wire out the money (in cash) to another account.
This is a Fake Check scam. Your bank may clear the check in 3 days. Then you will be asked by the scammer to wire the money to another bank account. Then the bank will contact you several days later to say that the check has bounced, and you have to return all the money and pay the charges for bounced checks.

4) You are asked to pay a fee to get the job.
Please note that a job offer is an agreement to engage your service in return for an agreed remuneration. You are paid to work. Never pay to get a job.

5) You are asked to buy something to get a job.
Never trust companies that ask you to buy something in order to work for them. If you need to pay for a start-up kit, make sure that the company is reputation. Just a test: In order to join Amway, a reputatble MLM company, you need to buy the startup kit? Will you buy this? If you are keen to join Amway as a partner, which we recommend, then you should buy the startup kit. However, if you don’t think you would buy the startup kit for Amway, then you should be even more careful about companies (esp. new ones) that does not have any track records. Do not be tricked into believing that “they are just starting up, so there is no track records yet”. For new companies, they have to bear the cost of the startup kits to get the initial group of followers.

6) A very high pay that is too good to be true.
It is not easy to get a high paying job. An enployer will evaluate your skills and experience before deciding the price tag. If a job is paying you a salary equivalent to a senior manage, but does not require any specialized skills or experience from you, it is 100%, a scam.