work at home entrepreneurs should beware of scammers

Scammers target desperate job seekers
Schemes that ask for money to set up clients in jobs that never materialize are proliferating, watchdogs say.
October 23, 2010|By Stuart Pfeifer, Los Angeles Times
One in a series of occasional reports about the U.S. unemployment crisis.
http://articles.latimes.com/2010/oct/23/business/la-fi-job-scams-20101024

Many of these schemes have been around for years, promising people who send money a chance to work as bartenders, home inspectors or "secret shoppers" for retail chains. But with nearly 15 million Americans out of work, consumer groups and law enforcement agencies say these scams are multiplying as con artists capitalize on the misery of the unemployed.

"It's an epidemic. It's opportunity time for fraud artists, and people are so desperate to earn a living that they easily fall for the scam," said Ellyn Lindsay, an assistant U.S. attorney in Los Angeles who has prosecuted several of these swindlers. Although federal authorities don't keep statistics on employment-related fraud incidents, the Better Business Bureau says such cases are on the rise.

The bureau received nearly 3,000 complaints about work-from-home scams in the first eight months of this year. That's more than double the 1,200 it received in the same period in 2007, just before the recession began, said Alison Southwick, spokeswoman for the Council of Better Business Bureaus.

Ida Jimenez, an unemployed mother of four from Fontana, said her attempt to work from home cost her $200 she couldn't afford to lose. It all started with an unsolicite e-mail: "If you have 60 minutes a day, here's a certified, proven and guaranteed way to make $225 and more every day, the easy way — from home!"
There was just one catch: She had to pay $197 for a guide before she could start processing manufacturer rebates from home. It seemed like such a good opportunity. After all, somebody has to do the paperwork on those things, she figured. Jimenez cut bac on grocery purchases until she'd saved enough money to get started. The guide never arrived. Jimenez spent weeks pursuing a refund, then gave up.

Crooks are counting on it. In contrast to investment fraudsters, who often seek big money from a small number of victims, job scammers aim to fleece large numbers of people for small amounts. Their hope is that victims won't squawk over modest sums, allowing the schemes to grow, undetected by authorities. The unemployed are particularly inviting targets because they have few resources to fight back.

A weak labor market is hurting the U.S. recovery, but it's been lucrative for scammers, who are bilking unemployed workers out of millions of dollars in fees to steer clients to jobs that never materialize, watchdogs say.

MY THOUGHTS

evil.simply evil. how can they even think of capitalizing on someone else's misery?