Money Safe

With the economy tanking, a lot of us are looking for a part-time job to help make ends meet. A lot of the most attractive jobs are ones that allow you to work from home. Many of these jobs are posted online. It sounds like a perfect situation for a stay-at-home mom. They offer flexible hours--maybe only requiring you to work an hour or less a day--and offer good pay and benefits. Some call it data entry. Others call it data processing. But what they are asking people to do is take checks that they are sent, cash them, take 10% for themselves, and then wire the rest to another account. I don't think I need to tell you that the checks are bogus. And when they bounce, the victims are out all of the money, plus overdraft charges from the bank.

I have been contacted by a number of local people who have fallen victim to this "work at home" scam:

Cami was lucky. She pulled out of the deal before she had her money stolen. But another viewer wasn't so fortunate. Angela lost thousands of dollars to con artists, pulling the exact same scheme.

Here's another viewer, who is in the midst of an online job scam:

Hi bill, so i recently just signed up for something similar to the money scam i heard about last night. i went and deposited the check and it's just sitting there and now the guy is calling me out of control and emailing me and telling me that i need to send them the rest of the money. i don't know what i should tell them. i've already reported this to the fbi. i called the bank and they said that so far the check is good and can't do anything for me. can you help me?

Julie:

The Federal Trade Commission says that you should take several steps right now.

First, contact your bank and let them know your situation. If you haven't spent any of the money, the bank can "freeze" those funds, so when the check bounces, you aren't going to be injured, and neither will the bank.

You did the right thing by forwarding your information to the FBI. It would also be a good idea to also file a police report with your local department. This way, you will have documentation that the police are involved.

And finally, it's probably best to not respond. After a while, they will get the message. DO NOT ANSWER THEIR PHONE CALLS OR RESPOND TO TEXT MESSAGES. There have been instances where these scammers have managed to slam charges onto a victims' phone bill.
If you do reply to an email, inform them that you have forwarded your correspondence to the FBI, and they should get the message, but they are persistent. I have investigated countless stories like this, and have gotten myself on the hook with these con artists, just to learn how they operate. I've found that once they get a potential mark on the hook, they are ruthless. They will call and email you constantly, day and night, demanding their money.

Thanks for writing in Julie, and good luck.

A warning from the FBI about these scams:

Job candidates should be cautious when seeking employment online, according to the FBI.

Authorities advise people who are scammed to immediately close all bank and e-mail accounts that could be jeopardized and contact all three credit bureaus to place fraud alerts on their files. They should also regularly monitor credit reports for signs of theft and report the fraud to the site that posted the scam as well as the FBI Internet Crime Complaint Center.

Here's another site worth checking out,
offering lots of good information about online offers that "look to good to be true".

I'm Bill Wixey, keeping your Money Safe.