Many job seekers are being conned on a daily basis from many online job sites. Conmen are taking advantage of the disparity of job seekers to mint millions of shillings in the pretext of connecting them with companies and Non-governmental organizations. Every year, Universities and colleges are churning out hundreds of Thousands of graduates. These graduates are, all of a sudden, faced with the sad reality of life outside college/campus. The extent of the scarcity of jobs scare them stiff and some end up with acute depression.
After a couple of years of unfruitful tarmacking, the majority get disillusioned and become so desperate that any offer that comes their way is like a mana dropped from heaven. At first, they look for well-paying jobs. When they realize that these kinds of jobs are unavailable, they resort to any kind of job so long as it can enable them to pay rent and purchase food. When they realize that these two are hard to come by, they end up becoming vulnerable to conmen.Job seekers are being asked to send Mpesa to secure/book interview sessions. Some are invited for interviews and after the interview, they are instructed to pay some amount in order to start working.
The most favorite strategy that most conmen use nowadays is that they inform you of a job offer by a well-known company/organization. They then ask for your papers and after they have delivered your papers to a specific big fish working in the company, they ask you to provide some documents which they insist are required immediately for the interview. Such documents usually range from Certificate of Good conduct to Higher Education Loans Board (HELB) Clearance certificate. If you say you do not have these documents and that it will take you some to time to acquire them, they tell you not to worry and assure you that they will get for you those documents in a few hours but it will cost you some money. After sending them the money, they simply switch off their phones and disappear into the thin air.
One way of spotting a dubious job offer is to do a background check on the company’s website. If you browse the website of the company and the information you find is scanty, then you have all the reasons to think twice. A genuine company will provide full information about it, including its history, on its website.
Another reason to worry is when the website of the company do not open or when the link is missing.On a serious note, no legit company or organization would ask you for money before even attending an interview. No legit company/organization would ask you for money for processing your documents. The moment you are asked to pay money in order to secure an interview or a job is the moment you should engage your right senses and think twice before hitting the M-pesa send button.
Another way of spotting a conman masquerading as an employer is when he or she insists on phone conversations only. When you try to meet him/her face to face s/he dodges and always find excuses not to meet you. This should make you suspicious.
(image: Fake job adverts by www.naukrigulf.com)