Public Cautioned on Phony Job Posting Scams

By Sonia Isotov

Today, the Hawaii Better Business Bureau issued an advisory cautioning job hunters to beware phony job posting scams.

“Job seekers need to be on the lookout for potential scams. Before posting your resume to a career site or inquiring about a job, make sure you know with whom you are dealing,” said Dwight Kealoha, president and CEO of Hawaii’s Better Business Bureaus, in a written statement. “Many job scammers are having candidates set up direct deposit accounts as part of the application process and making it seem as though it’s naturally part of the process to get an interview—when it’s absolutely not.”

With unemployment hovering around 7 % locally, and at 9.2% nationally, many job hunters are turning to online job boards to post their resumes and search for jobs. Job seekers being asked to proceed with caution before sharing their personal qualifications and inquiring about jobs found online.

Craigslist, Monster.com, Careerbuilder.com and Facebook are all reported sites for scams of this nature.

Therefore, the Hawaii BBB advises job hunters to look for these red flags when conducting their job search:

• Employer emails are rife with grammatical and spelling errors.
• Emails purporting to be from job posting websites claiming there’s a problem with a job hunter’s account.
• An employer asks for extensive personal information such as social security or bank account numbers. Never give out his or her Social Security or bank account numbers over the phone or email.
• An employer offers the opportunity to become rich without leaving home.
• An employer asks for money upfront, i.e. upfront fees, required purchases, or other sensitive information in order to be hired.
• The salary and benefits offered seem too-good-to-be-true.
• The job requires the employee to wire money through Western Union or MoneyGram

When in doubt, conduct a free company search at the Hawaii Better Business Bureau website at Hawaii.bbb.org.