If work-at-home offer sounds too good to be true, it probably is.

April 23rd, 2008 at 12:50am Deborah Austin

Mr. Edjuan Payne of Rockford came to visit me a few days ago, to tell me about his experiences with some Internet scams so I could warn other people about them.

Through popup ads on the Web, he found some out-of-state companies who promised him chances to get into home-based businesses. It sounded pretty good.

With one Internet offer, he signed up for a local conference put on by an out-of-state organization that promised to teach him how to acccess the govvenment grant, loan and subsidy system to get money that did not need to be paid back. He went to the conference, he said, “but I got bored, so I left. And they wanted $1,000 just to begin.”

He was fortunate that he left. He found out later, by consulting the Better Business Bureau, that the company had 90 consumer complaints filed against it over the past three years.

Another company’s offer did end up costing him money. It promised him a business selling credit-card swiping machines to local stores. He paid the company a fairly large sum by credit card to get the machines.

“They said it would take five to seven days to get the machines,” he told me. “After 14 days, all I got from them was a CD-ROM, and it was blank.”

That was when he knew he’d been scammed, and started checking on both companies and a few others with the Better Business Bureau. He filed a complaint there against the company with whom he’d spent money, and his credit card company is checking to see if he can recoup that money.

Then he got some Better Business Bureau reports on some other home-based business offers he’d been checking out. Total complaints filed with the BBB for four companies he’d been checking on: 498.

Mr. Payne just wanted to use his own experience to warn you our readers: Beware of Internet offers for home-based earning opportunities, and check out anything with the BBB before investing your money or time.

Dennis Horton, director of the BBB’s Rockford regional office, told me that such scams are an ongoing problem. These days they prey even more on unsuspecting would-be home-based earners.

“Everytime there’s a downturn in the economy or people lose their jobs, they start looking for ways to make money — and the Internet is a dangerous place to be when you’re doing that,” said Horton. “There are are multitude of scams out there, especially those that promise loans for new businesses, grants to start businesses, or work-at-home offers. We have seen an uptick in that locally, in the last one-and-a-half to two months.

“We get calls every day from someone who’s looking for that job that offers the opportunity to work at home and earn $3,000. We explain that’s not going to happen because if it were, we’d be the first to know! All those popups that people find on the Internet are really truly a dangerous place to start, because nine times out of 10, you are going to lose your money.”

Horton advised that when you’re checking out an Internet work-at-home offer, do a google search to find information similar to what the company is offering. “We’ve found that generally the same information you’re being asked to pay for in these offers is information you can get free on the Internet or from the library.”

And, of course, he added, check the company out with the Better Business Bureau.

You can contact the local office of the BBB at 815-963-2226. Or visit its Web site at www.rockford.bbb.org.

Take it from Mr. Payne, too. He knows from personal experience.

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