More Americans are working from home — an estimated 30 million people work from a home office at least once a week, and many work satisfaction surveys reveal that workers would trade a lower salary for the flexibility of telecommuting. So it’s no wonder that work-from-home scams are proliferating.
Some work-at-home scams involve “pay-to-play” schemes. An example would be if you are asked to send money in exchange for a special kit, supplies, or software that you can use to earn money working from home. Sometimes the company will promise to reimburse you when you are hired, but the job offer never materializes. Or the scammer might ask you to pay a subscription fee to access a website or a list of work-at-home opportunities.
The most common scam you’ve probably heard about is where you’re asked to deposit a legitimate-looking check and then wire money or buy products online, and then you’re left holding the bag when the check bounces. Your bank will require you to cover the full amount of the check plus bank service fees.
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Some of the most common work-at-home schemes target folks looking for extra holiday income, especially since many of these are advertised as part-time and work-at-home jobs. You have a lot of people who want to make an extra $100 for buying presents at the holiday time, so you’ll probably see more of those advertised around the holidays than you would at other times of the year. However, anytime a scammer can make money, they’re going to take advantage of it, holiday or not.
The most common work-at-home scams are “envelope-stuffing” jobs, assembly jobs (where you purchase supplies to assemble a craft or item, but when you submit the completed items for payment, they are rejected as “not being up to standards”), rebate processing, online survey-taking, and medical billing.
Be particularly cautious if the “employer” requests payment for something in the form of a pre-paid Visa card. It is very difficult to recover the money lost to a fraudulent transaction with a pre-paid debit card as there is often no paper trail.
Some work-at-home business opportunities promise a refund if you’re not satisfied; however, jobseekers that have attempted to obtain a refund are usually not successful.
Remember this: If it sounds too good to be true, it probably is.
