Action 9: Work from home offers can be tempting but risky

With so many Americans spending most of their days at home, job offers to work from your house can be tempting but finding remote work opportunities right now can be very risky.

Ayanna White thought she found the perfect part time job. She was hired by a work at home company to reship packages after testing its products.

But after a month, her $2,000 paycheck never arrived.

“I just feel used and scammed,” White said.

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Work at home scams always found easy targets. Now, with unemployment soaring plus the need to safely work at home, these schemes are more tempting.

“Scammers tend to use the phrases ‘work from home’ and ‘work at home.’,” said Brie Reynolds with flexjobs.com, a major service specializing in remote work offers.

The company warns when job hunting, avoid work at home searches that link to job scams.

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Those companies want your money first for fake application and supplies fees if you want a paycheck. And lookalikes are high risk too.

“We’ve seen scammers take the actual log and website design of actual well-known companies and create fake websites to lure people,” Reynolds said.

Besides phony fees, the bad guys could steal your identity.

You could also be helping criminals without realizing it.

“They are moving stolen goods across states lines and telling you that your testing out equipment to see if it works, like a laptop before it’s shipped,” Reynolds said.

That’s the exact scheme that burned White. She contacted local police after realizing what she was asked to do.

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Despite the surge of online job scams, real work opportunities exist.

Flexjobs.com screens ads to verify legitimacy.

And when searching online, enter "remote work" and "virtual job."

“Those phrases tend to be used by real companies offering legitimate jobs so that’s one thing to keep in mind,” Reynolds said.

With any remote work offer, verify the company on your own first.

And never send a company money to make money. That’s a costly scam.

© 2020 Cox Media Group