How to Evaluate Stay at Home Jobs
In a sea of scams promising that you can quit your day job and make hundreds or even thousands of dollars a day, finding a legitimate stay-at-home job can be a tough prospect. If you're not careful, scammers could wind up with your money or even sensitive personal information such as your Social Security numbers and bank accounts. Learning how to evaluate work from home opportunities will help you avoid these scams and find legitimate telecommuting jobs.
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Instructions
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Examine the job's advertisement. Does it say anything about the nature of the job or the experience necessary? Legitimate job postings will provide information about the work, while work-at-home scams will focus on unrealistically high salaries with only the vaguest information about what the job entails.
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2
Try to contact the company directly. Does it provide an address or telephone number? Do you have to provide an address, email address or other personal information in order to learn more about the company? Legitimate companies provide public information about themselves; they don't make you jump through hoops and give up personal information to access it.
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Look over the company's website. Does it look professional? Is it poorly formatted or riddled with spelling and grammar errors? Whether a company offering work-at-home opportunities is a foreign scam or simply doesn't care about its image, that firm would not be one you want to work for.
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Consider the salary offered. Is it reasonable for the work involved? Envelope stuffing, for example, is a popular scam job offer. Why would a company offer $1 to $2 for you to stuff envelopes when it could buy a machine to do it in the office? Similarly, ads offering outrageous rates for entry-level jobs should immediately be suspect. Legitimate work-at-home job ads will not focus on the salary, and may not even mention salary in the ad at all, preferring that you make an offer based on your previous salaries and experience.
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Search for any fees associated with the job. Legitimate firms with work-at-home jobs will not charge you for the privilege of working for them any more than legitimate non-telecommuting jobs would. Legitimate jobs don't make you pay for "special equipment" or to prove that you are really interested in the job.
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Research the company. Does it have a listing with the Better Business Bureau? When you plug the company name plus "scam" into a search engine, do you find a litany of complaints? Consider performing a background check of your own to see if the company is legitimate.
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Tips & Warnings
If you've been taken in by a work-at-home scam, take steps to protect yourself and future victims. Contact your credit card company or bank about fraudulent charges. Report the company to agencies such as the National Fraud Information Center, your local consumer protection agency and the Internet Crime Complaint Center.
