Member Education & Consumer Tips

Job Offer Scams

You might receive an email offering a job where you use your financial account to receive and pass on payments for a foreign company. They will send you checks to be deposited into your financial account. After you deposit the checks, they instruct you to send the money, minus your 10%-15% commission for processing the checks through your account, via money wire to a location outside the United States. A short time later, it is discovered that the checks they sent you were fraudulent and you are responsible for the entire amount of the checks, including the money that was wired. Any jobs that direct you to deposit checks and then wire out money, keeping only a small portion for yourself, is going to be fraudulent. Here are a few Warning signs:

• You receive a job offer claiming that you can make a lot of money with little effort by using your home computer.
• You receive an offer for a work from home job that requires you to pay a registration fee or to send your home address for more information.
• You receive information about a job, which only requires you to transfer money for someone else.

Here are a few ways to protect yourself:

• Remember there are no get-rich-quick schemes: the only people who make money are the scammers.
• Beware of products or schemes that claim to guarantee income or winnings.
• Beware of job offers that require you to pay an upfront fee.
• Money laundering is a criminal offence: do not agree to transfer money for someone else.
• NEVER send money, or give credit card or online account details to anyone you do not know and trust.
• Do not open suspicious or unsolicited emails (spam): delete them.

Should you have additional questions, please contact our Member Service Center at (800) 479-7928.