Fraud takes many forms, but it always involves someone
promising to reward you or pay you for cash or services and you not getting the
agreed upon reward. More and more people are finding that online fraud
stretches to the job market as well. Michael Majeed Markham fraud investigator
sees bad things like this happen to good people all the time.
How Online Job Fraud
Occurs
The most common method of job fraud occurs from companies
outsourcing their online work. They usually look for workers on freelance websites
like Freelancer.com. The scammers post a job, promising specific wages to the
workers who are accepted, then get people to do some work for them.
When payday comes around though, the workers are not
compensated for their completed work, and the scammers are revealed. They then
take the work already finished and move on to the next victim.
Many times there is no recourse the average person can take
after being cheated out of their time and effort like this. Because scammers of
this nature tend to use fake names and dummy email accounts, they are hard to
track and even harder to pursue with legal action.
But Michael Majeed Markham fraud investigator would have
experience dealing with online scammers. As a trained professional he knows how
to handle cases of this nature.
How to Avoid Being
Scammed
People who have been scammed once already online may know what
to look for, but you want to make sure it does not happen to you in the first
place. When you are searching for a job on a freelancing website, one set of
red flag keywords is “Only serious inquiries” or any derivation of that. It
tends to be a common tagline of job fraud criminals.
A stronger indication that your potential employer could be
scamming you is rude behavior. If they insult you or seem to have a very short
temper, these can be methods they use to cow you into submission and avoid
questions. You should especially be wary if this type of hostile attitude comes
up when payment is discussed.
You should also look out for employers who have not completed
any jobs. Most freelance websites will tell you how many times employers have
paid for jobs. If there are none listed, it could be that they are a new
employer, but it could also be because they have scammed all their hires.
The final major indicator you should use to determine the
verity of a freelance employer is how closely they stick to the terms of their
agreement with you. If they want to change payment dates after you have already
submitted work and extend the time you have to work before you are paid, you
should immediately question them.
This scamming tactic is simply used to draw you into more work
before their scam is revealed. Most honest freelance employers have no problem
paying at milestones (such as every week or after a certain amount of work has
been completed). Michael Majeed Markham fraud investigator sees scammers take
advantage of people all the time. If you ignore the warning signs and end up
getting scammed out of your hard work, then you should contact a fraud
specialist who can handle your case for you.
