What’s the deal with Work From Home Scams?

I can’t begin to describe how irritating it is to log onto facebook, click on marketplace, and see all of the junk that has flooded an otherwise very useful application. There are so many fake accounts sprouting up every day selling $200 brand new apple iphones and $300 brand new Play Station 3’s.

There’s also no shortage of “Hey, Want a Free Nintendo Wii? Click here!” Then when you click, there’s some elaborate process of filling out offers and referring your friends and such. After you’ve completed the required offers which likely require you to spend money or sign up for something else, and after you’ve referred the correct number of friends who probably resent you now for spamming them, you’d have been better off going to the store and just buying a Nintendo Wii yourself.

Something else I’ve seen an abundance of in the facebook marketplace is these data-entry/work at home gigs. First of all, these listings all have provocatively dressed women as the main picture in order to get people’s attention. I’ve clicked on a couple of the links just to see where it would take me. What I found funny was the fact that so many of these sites had different web addresses, but as soon as you click, you’re lead to 1 of maybe 5 differet web addresses. They all seem to re-route you to 1 of the same 5 or so web addresses! The fact that they try to get you to pay X amount of dollars so that you can make a ludicrous $200 a day or whatever the case me be is simply annoying. It’s not even a guarantee for a job…you’re paying for a list. I love the fact that they put a clever code on their websites saying something along the lines of “We’re offering you a 50% discount, but that discount only lasts until midnight, 3 days after January 21th” Then you look at your calendar and *gasp!* it’s January 24! I better sign up fast!! Argh!

Whenever I see one of those work at home things I always type the name of the page in my google search engine bar and immediately type the word scam right after it. As soon as I hit the letter “s” to type the word scam, it appears automatically. That tells me that several other people are trying to investigate these websites too. I find that people often question the legitimacy of these work at home pages either on yahoo questions, or on the appropriately named webpage http://www.scam.com/

I’m lucky. I have a great job that is very accomodating. They understand that sometimes I’ll call in sick to work because I feel ill. It’s a great job, I can sit at my desk and not have to move around too much, and I also have great benefits. What more can I ask for?

But not everyone is that lucky. This got me wondering. Are there actually any legit work from home jobs out there? I know that there are a lot of people who would like to work from home for various reasons, be it due to illness, fatigue, needing to be home to watch over children/loved ones, etc. I thought to myself that there must be legit companies out there that need or want people who work from home.

I found a couple of pages, and I’ll be sure to post more as they come up. Most of the pages that I found were more geared towards people living in the United States. While I live in Canada, I know that a lot of people who read my blog are from the United States, so this might help out. If you’re from Canada, check out some of the links anyways. Who knows what you’ll find? My main criterion for posting a job was NO FEE! I haven’t had any personal experience with any of the sites listed, but perhaps if you find anything worthwhile on these sites, you can let me know? 🙂

People often come up with fake blogs with referral links where they get credit if you click in their link. I want to assure you that this isn’t the case for the links below. In no way do I benefit from you clicking those links. I’m just hoping to find some links for legit websites that have work from home oppourtunities.

1) Genuine Jobs: http://www.genuinejobs.com/members/jobs.php
2) Workaholics 4 Hire: http://www.workaholics4hire.com/
3) Work at Home Jobs: http://www.workathomecareers.com/workathomejobs/ (select a category to find a job in that field)