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cicilyphillips
Community Member

Should I be worried about being scammed?

Hello, I am new to Upwork and I Submitted a proposal to a data entry position on Tuesday and now they have offered me the position. But it feels to good to be true. I had an interview via Google Hangouts. All my correspondance has been email and google hangouts. They are offering to buy all the equipment they want me to use (Mac Book and various software). Today they told me that they are sending a check for me to pay for the equipment and I need to deposit it into my account and then I will pay the retailer who will provide all the equipment. Then I asked why I had to receive the money and deposit to my account? Why not send the money directly to the retailer, this is the response:

**Edited for Community Guidelines**

 

He told me I will receive the money via fedex tomorrow and have to deposit within 24hrs. I am very worried this is a scam. I am new to this site and am not sure what should be expected. When I go to my profile the proposal is still in Active state, it has never moved to my contract section. As I am typing this out it sounds quite crazy. So it probably is a scam.

 

Also the employer just became a member of Upwork so there are no reviews or anything. The company is Oyster Property Group. I looked on their website and the person I am talking to is listed as a Board member. The letter of employment I received has the CEO and CFO's name/signature. Am I crazy to think this is legit. I will attach the offer letter.

**Edited for Community Guidelines**

ACCEPTED SOLUTION
g_vasilevski
Retired Team Member
Retired Team Member

Hi Cicily,

 

I can confirm the job post you are referring to was already removed and client's account addressed for violating Upwork ToS. Please take a look at the list of tips for recognizing fraudulent jobs Lena compiled and posted Here. Thank you.

~ Goran
Upwork

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7 REPLIES 7
g_vasilevski
Retired Team Member
Retired Team Member

Hi Cicily,

 

I can confirm the job post you are referring to was already removed and client's account addressed for violating Upwork ToS. Please take a look at the list of tips for recognizing fraudulent jobs Lena compiled and posted Here. Thank you.

~ Goran
Upwork

Thank you so much for your quick response. Something in my gut is telling me it is a scam because they were offering way too much. I will end all correspondence with them. Thanks again. 

Cicily, I'm sincerely not trying to be rude; but if you were nearly taken in by this scam, you really do need to learn much more before submitting any further proposals. There's an abundance of information within "Help and Support" and this Community to assist FLs in getting off to a great start and becoming successful. All you have to do is search, read/view/listen, absorb, and put into practice.

 

I very quickly viewed your Profile. Curiosity question-why do you note Data Entry and Customer/Admin. Support and are evidently pursuing those areas but have both a BS in Computer Engineering and an MBA? Of course it's your choice, but it appears that you should be more qualified than the areas you're expressing an interest in.  Also, FYI you're going to experience a huge amount of competition as there's an extreme amount of FLs in those areas here.

Thanks Pat for your advice, I will do more research about this site and proposal submitting. 

 

I currently have a full-time IT position at a great company but need some extra income to pay off some debt. So that is why I chose this route because after working 8 hrs a day at my normal job I wanted something easy and mindless work that would give me extra income and that I could do from home on my own time. The IT freelancer jobs that I did look at were mostly developer, etc. which I am not a developer. But I will keep looking and maybe revise my plan. I came on this site as a suggestion from a friend and hey had suggested doing some easy jobs to make some extra income. Thanks for your response. 

re: "Should I be worried about being scammed?"

 

Cicily:

Pat and I are not worred about being scammed. The regular Forum participants and experienced Upwork freelancers are not worried about being scammed.

 

But you SHOULD be worried about being scammed. Until you understand Upwork better. There will come a point - soon - when you aren't worried at all about being scammed. You're just not at that point yet.

 

Until you get to that point, feel free to ask questions as often as you want here in the Forum. We like identifying scams and helping newbies avoid them.

Thanks Preston H, noted and lesson learned. 

martina_plaschka
Community Member


Cicily P wrote:

Hello, I am new to Upwork and I Submitted a proposal to a data entry position on Tuesday and now they have offered me the position. But it feels to good to be true. I had an interview via Google Hangouts. All my correspondance has been email and google hangouts. They are offering to buy all the equipment they want me to use (Mac Book and various software). Today they told me that they are sending a check for me to pay for the equipment and I need to deposit it into my account and then I will pay the retailer who will provide all the equipment. Then I asked why I had to receive the money and deposit to my account? Why not send the money directly to the retailer, this is the response:

**Edited for Community Guidelines**

 

He told me I will receive the money via fedex tomorrow and have to deposit within 24hrs. I am very worried this is a scam. I am new to this site and am not sure what should be expected. When I go to my profile the proposal is still in Active state, it has never moved to my contract section. As I am typing this out it sounds quite crazy. So it probably is a scam.

 

Also the employer just became a member of Upwork so there are no reviews or anything. The company is Oyster Property Group. I looked on their website and the person I am talking to is listed as a Board member. The letter of employment I received has the CEO and CFO's name/signature. Am I crazy to think this is legit. I will attach the offer letter.

**Edited for Community Guidelines**


You just need to ask yourself why a legit company or person would buy stuff for a stranger they don't know. Legit companies or persons don't do that. Second question is if upwork would like you to receive money without them getting a fee. 

So in short, not only would you be scammed out of your money, upwork  could kick you out because of circumvention, too.

Bad idea all-around. 

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