this one is for those actively looking for employment rather than self employment (we have plenty of our own he says looking at a demand for payment for stationary from a company that he has had absolutely no dealings with... Put that one in the pile with the demands for payment for a music license).
As always where there are people desperate for something then someone will be there to find a way of making money out of them.
The Scam that I have read about involves bogus agencies advertising bogus jobs.
People send their cv's, get a call back feigning interest based on your skillset / qualification and you go into the agency to register.
Ignoring the fact that you give enough information over to be an identity thiefs dream the scam is that you have to pay £50 for various professional checks which will you are told take a couple of weeks to complete.
There are of course no checks and the agency is gaining £50 per candidate then after about a month they disappear to set up in a different town / city with a different name and do the same again.
This is a volume based scam rather than coning job seekers out of huge sums individually. With the sheer number of people looking for so few jobs these fly by might agencies are raking in quite a lot of money.
Don't ask me about the details as to how they get premises... Maybe they are using the identity of a previous applicant. All I know is what I have read and thought it worth letting people know that there is a scam out there based on fleecing those least able to afford it.
This is not an industry specific con and the latest that I heard of was 50+ entry level postal worker jobs charged £50 each for CRB checks then they get to the depot on the day to be met by bemused staff wondering what the heck all these people are doing at the gates.
Whilst I would like to think that the conning of the unemployed despertate to get back onto the job ladder is a new low I somehow think that there is much worse out there.
Harsh as it may seem to legitimate new agencies out there the only way to avoid this scam and the associated risk of identity theft seems to be to only deal with agencies that you know have been around for more than two minutes.
Please feel free to add any other current cons that you know of to the thread.
kind est regards,
Shaun.
p.s. Lets be careful out there people
p.s.2 if it's irritating you where that quote came from it's Hill Street Blues.
__________________
Shaun
Responses are not meant as a substitute for professional advice. Answers are intended as outline only the advice of a qualified professional with access to all relevant information should be sought before acting on any response given.
........the demands for payment for a music license).
.......
Hi Shaun
Thanks for the heads up.
One point though, which will probably not affect most forum members, is the demand for music licences. Although I was wary when I got the letter (then a phone call), it turns out these are legitimate checks.
There are two quasi authorities that monitor, and check the use of copyrighted music. The first is PRS (Performing Rights Society) which deal with the royalties due to the writers, and composers of music. the other is PPL (Phonographic Performance Ltd) which deal with the royalties due to recorded music publishers (including printed music score).
They two organisations, are subscibed to by the various artists, producers etc, on a membership basis. They basically check that businesses that play music that can be heard by their customers, or staff have paid the required royalty fee, which is a flat rate licence. So if you have a radio, cd player, or piped music on in an office/ factory/ workshop etc where the public , or staff can listen to it, then a licence is due (in reality, one from each society).
The PRS is the main organisation that is checking, and it is quite probable, that any business is likely to get a letter. They have become more proactive in doing checks since the advent of different types of music media, such MP3, and downloads. That's why there is a sudden influx of letters and phone calls from them.
One of the reasons I am aware of this (apart from getting a phone call myself) is that one of my clients has music supplied through an internet connection to his restaurant. When he got a letter from PRS he contacted his music supplier and asked if the licence was incoporated in his supply agreement. Apparently it is not, and the supplier confirmed that the licence needed to be paid
