By: Stephen Kreutzer

Working at home is very popular. As with anything that is popular there are people out there who like to try to scam those looking for work at home jobs. Scams can sometimes be hard to recognize, but if a person knows what to look for they can raise their chances of not being caught in a work at home scam. A popular way to get taken by a scam work at home company is when they ask a person to pay them money.

The first key that a work at home opportunity may be a scam is that the company asks for money up front. This is also something that can be confusing because some legitimate companies ask for money, too. The main rule abut paying money is that if the job were not work at home would it be reasonable to pay money up front to work with this company. If it is a job where the person is required to keep an inventory of products than it is reasonable to pay something upfront for the inventory. However, if the payment is for administrative fees that is a red flag. A work at home job is like any other job. Nobody would pay a company to process their employment papers, so it is unreasonable for a work at home company to request payment for this purpose.

What usually happens when a company is running a scam by asking for money up front is that the hopeful work at home employee loses their money and gets no real job in return. Many scam companies try to use the trick that they will refund the money after a person has worked for them for so long. Once a person pays the money and begins working for the company they learn there really is no refund. In these cases the work at home employee usually also finds out the job duties are completely different from what they were originally told. The whole concept is the scam company makes their main income off potential work at home employees, not through a real business.

Almost any good reference on working at home will mention not to ever pay money for a work at home job. It may seem like common sense, but can be confusing for someone who is new to the work at home industry. Many of these scams seem real and also come across as a way to make big money fast. This type of money scam is the biggest of all work at home scams.

Article Source: http://www.ArticleJoe.com

Stephen Kreutzer is a freelance publisher based in Cupertino, California. He publishes articles and reports in various ezines and provides home business tips on Home Business Roundup.

By: SadieJane

Do you ever feel like you know just enough about a topic to be dangerous? We will try to fill in some of the gaps with the latest info from experts.

The following article covers a topic that has recently been of high interest, work at home scams. If you have been considering a journey down this road, take the time to learn more before you start. Yes, before you start.

As you first start to consider work at home opportunities, you have to be aware that at least 99% of the offers you see are scams. Logically, if is so easy to pay just a few dollars and easily earn thousands, why would they even share that information? Here are some of the biggest scams, both online and offline, plus ways to recognize and avoid them.

First pay attention to where you saw the Get Rich Quick offer? Email offer, a poster on a bulletin board or a sign along the road will be a scam. Legitimate offers for high earnings are not posted casually for drive by traffic. Newspaper or magazine ads are more likely to be honest jobs, but not for certain. Take care and ask questions. Website advertisements are everywhere. This is a huge area where fraud is abundant, and a few honest offers may be found. Presume that it is a scam until you have actual proof that the offer is real.

Envelope Stuffing is one of the oldest work at home scams. And, yet it is still promoted, and people do still send in their money. After you spend your money and sign up, you are shipped a supply of envelopes and advertisements just like the advertisement you enrolled with. Now, you will spend your time to stuff your envelopes and you again spend your money to send them out. There is a very tiny possibility you might actually earn a little. But it is a small possibility, and only after someone else responds to the advertisement you mailed. Just stay far away from this scam.

Home assemblers wanted, and you will earn big money doing what you love, from the comfort of home. Yes, we have all seen it. The scam involves seriously over-charging you for supplies. First you will be required to purchase their materials. And you will be sent some assembly materials, but extremely poor quality, and not materials as described, or the expected value for what you are charged. So first you have invested your money for cheap materials, and then you spend more, in the form of your labor. Now you to start earning, all you have to do is find buyers for your items. And to your surprise, no one wants to buy your cheap-quality finished product.

If a business, or program or anyone asks you to spend money to start work for them, just walk away. Every honest and reputable business will deduct their enrollment or startup fees from your first paycheck. There is only one reason any business would not deduct legitimate, reasonable fees from your first or future pay. They have no intention of ever paying you.

If your fraud knowledge and facts are out-of-date, how will that affect your actions and decisions? Make certain you do not let important fraud information slip by you, or take you in as the next victim.

If you base your actions on inaccurate information, you might be unpleasantly surprised by the consequences. Make sure you get the whole story from informed sources.

A variation on the scam that is very common with crafts is that you might be asked to work at home making jewelry, doll clothes, decorations, or toys. Everything may appear honest. You would actually receive the materials without first spending any money, and you would then do the specified work. But, regardless of your skill, care taken, and attention to detail, when you send the completed items to the company, you will not receive payment. The business will notify you that, unfortunately, the items do not meet their quality standards, and therefore, they will not issue payment. If you want to do craft work from home, select your own projects, buy your own quality materials and then market and sell items yourself.

Another common area of fraud involves data entry, home typing, plus medical coding and medical invoicing scams. These types of work at home scams will tell you they currently have high volume of work to process, and they prefer home workers to avoid overhead expenses. You will be offered position to enter data, or type documents, or medical coding and then process medical invoices into a computer. The requirements for the job are only that you have access to a computer. But you first have to do is buy their job related special software. What they do not tell you is that you will also need to find your own work assignments.

This unique, and required, software will appear to be sold through a completely unrelated company. This is just one more deception. Selling you the software was the only reason the work at home advertisement was placed.

Remember to consider the points presented above, and also the time to investigate the online offer. After you selected a program of interest, take the time to type in another search. But this time, search for the name of your program, plus the word scam, or the word fraud. If others have had a problem, most likely you would encounter that same problem.

I hope this information helps you see running a home business that involves you working for one company can be a risky idea. You do not really know whom you are dealing with. Then consider, even with entirely honest work at home positions that do actually pay you for your work, your work is earning money for someone else, and you are only receiving a small portion. By working for yourself with your own home business, you keep the rewards of your own efforts.
Do not limit yourself by refusing to learn the details first. The more you know, the easier it will be to determine and focus on your real goal.

Article Source: http://www.ArticleJoe.com

SadieJane is the owner and webmaster of a few sites on the internet. She has been marketing online for some time now, and is also the author of articles on marketing, the internet, and finances.

http://www.onlineopportunities.biz/
http://www.sadiesinfomall.com/

By: Wendy Betterini

I’m sure we’ve all seen the ads: “Earn $1000’s weekly stuffing envelopes from home!” Have you ever been tempted to send in your money for that one? I have. Luckily I didn’t do it, but I know many people have. It sounds so great, doesn’t it? Sit at home watching television while stuffing hundreds of envelopes, and get a nice check every week. If only such a job existed! Don’t fool yourself, it doesn’t. Why? Companies can easily purchase a machine that will not only stuff the envelopes for them, it will also fold, collate and apply postage in many cases. These machines usually cost a few thousand dollars. Why on earth would they pay you thousands of dollars a month to stuff their envelopes, when they could purchase a machine for a one time charge that would continue to stuff their envelopes for years to come? It makes no sense.

Scammers want you to believe. They know you’re desperate to work at home. They know that Moms would do almost anything to be able to stay home with their children and earn a decent income at the same time. They know that college students need extra money, and retirees are living on a fixed income. And they want your money. They know you’re willing to dish out ten or twenty bucks if it will allow you to earn some good extra cash.

Scammers are very practiced in saying exactly the right words to get you to believe they are for real. They’ve been doing it for years, and probably won’t stop any time soon. Too many people fall for their lies, and the scammers are earning a very nice income themselves - by suckering you out of your hard-earned money!

However, there is something you should think about for a moment. Scammers are not the only ones doing the fooling much of the time. We also fool ourselves. We see an ad like the one above, and we begin to dream about how great that would be, to sit home and stuff envelopes all day. We visualize ourselves going to the bank with a hefty check, being able to pay all of our bills on time, and have money left over. We see our children helping us to stuff envelopes so the family can earn even more money. We see ourselves driving a new car, buying a nice home, all from our envelope-stuffing proceeds.

At the same time, a little voice deep inside us starts to speak up, “Wait a minute, something about this seems to good to be true …” — But we squelch down that little voice. We don’t want to hear that. We tell the voice, “You’re ruining my fantasy, shut up. It has to be true; I need this so badly. It would be the answer to my prayers.” So we send our money, get ripped off and then kick ourselves for being so stupid. The scammer merely planted the idea in our heads, we picked it up and ran with it.

Don’t let them do that to you, and don’t do that to yourself! Be realistic about your search for work at home. Understand that working at home means working at home. You can’t expect to get a mindless job and earn great money from it. Most often, you will earn less working at home than you do at a regular job. (Unless you start your own business.)

As a side note, many home business opportunities are guilty of the same tactics when trying to recruit new representatives. They tell you that you will earn great money while having fun. That may be true, but they conveniently forget to mention that you will actually have to WORK. You will have to be consistent in your efforts, and work on improving your skills, both professional and personal. You will need to sell something, either a product or a service. Which means you will need to talk to people, either online, over the phone, or in person. You don’t just sign up and start cashing big paychecks. Keep that in mind when exploring business opportunities.

Ultimately, we are responsible for our own actions. Yes, the scammers are using dirty tricks. But we have the option whether to believe them or not. Fortunately, we can be smarter than they are. We all have this neat little built-in warning system called intuition. Use it. If something seems too good to be true, or you have any doubts at all, listen to that.
Rather than being desperate to work at home, be determined to find a REAL opportunity. Use common sense and learn as much as you can about scams and the genuine opportunities available. There are so many great companies out there that really do want to hire good people to work at home. And as time goes on, more and more great companies will be joining the ranks. This is very good news for us because the more legitimate companies there are, the less opportunity scammers will have. They will slowly but surely be pushed out. What a grand day that will be!

Article Source: http://www.ArticleJoe.com

Wendy Betterini is a freelance writer, web designer and owner of www.CreativeWorkAtHome.com, a resource center for home business owners and telecommuters. Visit today for information on how to make your work at home experience successful.

By:mcomo

I’m sure you’ve seen the ads. Data Entry for cash, Type Simple Data Entry from home, Data Entry Income and more. Can Data Entry from home be a money maker or is it a Scam?

If you are comfortable typing on a computer then Data Entry Jobs may be for you. Often there are misconceptions when data entry that you will be typing endlessly to earn nothing. The truth is though that data entry is an easy work at home job if you feel comfortable on the computer If you can type at a good speed and be accurate. Of course today with the tools available like spell check, grammar check etc, it makes it a lot easier. In fact it’s possible to earn over $40 per hour doing data entry jobs online.

Another misconception is that data entry jobs are scams. This is probably the “too good to be true” adverts with promises of overnight riches working from home. Some people will join a Data Entry program and think that the money will start flowing in. If it doesn’t then they call the program a failure. You won’t get something for nothing. There are legitimate data entry work programs available. In fact I have a separate Data Entry web page whereby I highlight what in my opinion are the best and most popular Data Entry programs.

Data entry is one of the more popular home based business opportunities as it is very low-cost to get started. I have included a list of equipment that you will need to start below:

Computer
Access to Internet
Printer
Business cards

I would also suggest that you use a unique email address. This is merely a suggestion not a requirement.

The potential in the data entry business is great. There are many small and large companies that outsource data entry. Many people are making $1000 - $3000 a month additional income. In order to get to this level of income it is important that you understand the skills that you’ll need and where to look for data entry programs.

Please feel free to visit my web page for Data Entry product reviews. If you decide to try one of our programs, please let me know your opinion of the whole process. Your opinion is important to me. I also have a FREE Email Newsletter series, which gives you the Top Rated Data Entry Programs.

Michael Comeau has been owner of many successful businesses over the years including his current online business which can be viewed at www.workfromhome4dollars.com/

You may also find more articles by Michael Comeau at www.workfromhome4dollars.com/Articles.php

Article Source: http://greatarticlesformoms.com

 By: Robert Saville

Over the past 10 years or so the home business industry has literally exploded. As the home business industry approaches the $500 billion mark scams are popping up everywhere. Unfortunately, more and more people are falling victim to these scam artists and as a result vowing never again to try and realize their dreams of working from home. People seem to be living by the old saying, “scam me once, shame on you. Scam me twice, shame on me.” Once a person has been scammed there is a natural thought process that warns maybe all home business opportunities are scams. After all, almost everybody knows somebody that has lost money in an MLM scam.

If you were to do an online search for, “home business opportunities,” it would take you a couple of days to read all the ads. Most of which are either misleading or just outright lies. It seems almost impossible to figure out which ones are legitimate and which ones are scams.

However, there is a way to sift through all the scams to find those little nuggets that can help you be well on your way to making money from home. Here are a few tips that can help you avoid scams and find the real winners.

1. Most scams are never “upfront” with explaining how you will actually make money. Most ads will say, “no selling, no phone calls, no work,” as if they want you to think money is going to fall out of thin air. Always remember, no one is going to make a dime until some sort of product or service is sold.

2. Most scams do not offer any type of support either by phone or email. You will need help getting your business up and running on the right track. If someone has developed a really good business model they will be glad to help you to succeed.

3. Here is the biggest tip off that you are about to be scammed. Do they offer a no questions asked, money back guarantee? If not, stay as far away as you can get. Any good business developer knows that no business appeals to everyone. If they truly have confidence in their business model, they have nothing to lose by offering you a full guarantee.

Following these few simple steps can save you worlds of time and give you the confidence you need to move forward. Don’t let a bad past experience keep you from accomplishing your dreams and goals.

Article Directory: http://www.articledashboard.com.
Robert Saville has had a great deal of success working from home over the past 3 years. His website www.homebiztop5.com helps people find the information they need to start their own successful home business.