New to Upwork , Hired by fake client - Beware

[b8c63425]

I'm new to Upwork , Submitted a proposal for **Edited for Community Guidelines**

I got a message in upwork saying we accepted your proposal and wanted to hire you immediately and the person started sending emails to my personal gmail ID sharing his skype ID .He started talking over skype and all the conversations went over skype by Name **Edited for Community Guidelines** . He stated he is an employee of a**Edited for Community Guidelines**. After sometime of conversation over skype he was impressed and sent an Offer letter to my gmail ID. He continuously kept on asking please send the signed offer letter. I asked him to have phone conversation to discuss on the terms defined in the offer letter and he kept on denying saying he is busy and would always consider Skype call.
After signing the offer letter , He said i would receive a startup bonus $150 and he sent a digital check worth of $950 and asked me to do a mobile deposit immediately. He also asked what is the maximum deposit or withdrawal on mobile deposit .That is when we suspected its fake client when we asked him to direct the amount thru Upwork.He kept on saying we will do mobile deposit to your account and he was giving another $800 extra to settle the vendor for processing the purchase order for all the required equipment.
Though he says he is from USA , he was never ready to talk over the phone and was always interested with skype or chat.

**Edited for Community Guidelines**

[b8c63425]

These are the email ID they have used to email me **Edited for Community Guidelines**

[AndreaG · Accepted solution]

Hi Prasanthi,

Please know that communicating outside of Upwork before a contract is in place is against our Terms of Service. This is to prevent situations like this. We find that when users communicate outside of Upwork there is an increased risk of fraud, scam, and other harmful behaviors. When communications (and work) stay on our platform we can better track, verify, and help address any issues that emerge, and as a result the potential for these behaviors to cause harm decreases dramatically. For example, the vast majority of scammers that successfully take advantage of talent do so by going off the platform. To learn more about staying safe on Upwork, click here.

Please go ahead and flag this client, every report is sent directly to our Trust and Safety team for investigation.

[b8c63425]

 I couldnt create a flag against the job posting ashe removed the job and cleared the messages in Upwork

[AndreaG]

That's all right, Prasanthi. It means the account has already been actioned by our team.