How to Spot Fake Online Jobs

At Ojuelegba bus-stop, the ever-busy scenes of moving vehicles were interwoven with constant pedestrians crossing the road at different junctions. Ralia crossed too and bumped instantly into a young boy who quickly moved back for her to pass after registering his apologies. He then thrust out his hand at her; because she was in a hurry, Ralia collected the flyer and put it in her hand bag without looking at what the young boy gave her. Home bound in the bus, she took out her purse from her handbag and the flyer dropped, she picked it up and read. Employment scams and fake jobs adverts online are rapidly taking their place in the labour market. This is what Ralia will later find out because the flyer the boy gave her was not a religious text as she thought it was. Rather it was a collection of job adverts directing prospective and unassuming job seekers to an online address of the prospective employer. This is how the scam works.

At the online address, the job seeker will be asked to submit his CV online on or before a said date. After the said date, the job seeker will be contacted and asked to come for a test at the testing centre. The job seeker will meet hundreds of other job seekers and that will convince him that he is on the right track. The testing centre is usually on the premises of a government owned primary or secondary institution. Access to these properties is easy with a little bribe here and there. Then the scam begins. These gullible and desperate job seekers will be asked to part with a paltry sum of n500 each for the writing materials. We all know the country is hard. Because it is a general notion in Nigeria that you must pay for whatever service that is being rendered you even if there is no need for it. Just like in this case. A week after the test, the scam continues. A text message will be sent to all the candidates that took the test to come for an interview because they passed the test. This will be in different categories in which they applied for. Also contained in the text message will be a consultancy fee of n3000. The scam usually ends after the interview. Before the job seekers will realize that they have been scammed, another job scam will have been served online to get their mind off the first. Armed with only an online address and physical address of a public school, the job seekers will have nothing to hold on to.

To spot a job scam is easy. Jobs don’t come on flyers. These days scammers, fake recruitment agencies advertise in newspapers, after job seekers contact them, they will ask the job seekers to pay a fee to secure job placement. No reputable employer will ask a job seeker to pay money for whatever reason before or after employment.

Any address that cannot be traced to a physical place like a website address should not be trusted as a real address of a prospective employer.

In all, the best way to spot a job scam is not having to spot one at all. Apply for jobs online only through registered career consulting companies; career development firms and outsourcing firms.

For Latest Job Vacancies in Nigeria visit http://www.nigeriabestjobs.com

Follow Toni Adewuni on Twitter @nigeriabestjobs Her website http://www.nigeriabestjobs.com is dedicated to publishing Jobs in Nigeria, Guardian Newspaper Vacancies, Latest employment opportunities in Nigeria