Have you ever wondered how people are so gullible to be scammed about a job offer? Well, it is because too many job scams are getting way too good these days and it is really easy to scam a person who needs a job, especially with the economy rising.

A few months ago my friend was scammed for a job. She received a phone call, and the person from the other line claimed to be a recruiter from a well-known company and that my friend had been selected for an interview at that company. Of course, she was excited that her application was received after applying to so many companies in Rwanda.

When she went for the interview, she was scammed into giving out her phone and laptop. Of course, they were too many red flags to notice but due to her excitement and joy she didn’t notice that the interview didn’t even take place in the actual company.

Sometimes these scams are very obvious and sometimes they are blinding, but they can’t be scams if we also become smart as the scammers, says Elisee Iradukunda, a business consultant.

"Some scammers are not really clever and that’s why we end up asking ourselves if a person can be blinded at that point, but any scam can blind you depending on how badly you want something. Some job scams even appear to be very professional but yet are scams. You have to be smart as the scammers because the red flags are usually visible if we allow them to be, yes some young people are eager to find a job and work for money immediately, but before accepting any email or call for a job do simple research on the company, or if the company is a well-known one, call the company and ask them if they are recruiting, if they say no it is a scam,” he says.

Iradukunda states that these job scams are scams when they contact you and fail to determine where they got your contacts from.

"Scammers have lists where they keep phone numbers or emails, in case they want to scam people and so they call or email them, most of them won’t tell you immediately where they got your contacts from, they will rather distract you from that question. They will either lie that they found it on your socials or on hiring platforms, but who on earth would find their recruit on Instagram and would want to hire them without even getting to know about their background, also if they mention that they got your details from a hiring website, double check if you ever put your details on any hiring platform and also if they are right to do a background check on them,” he says.

Ange Umurungi, a project manager, adds that some job scams usually ask a person to pay a certain amount for them to be hired.

"There are jobs that will blatantly ask a person to pay a certain amount to get hired. Some will notice red flags like fees for the documents you will need at work or equipment like a badge or a laptop. But honestly, no company would ask its employees to pay money for a badge or a laptop because it is the company’s responsibility to provide for that. There is no such thing as a company that uses the fact that it is still a start-up to make employees pay for the things the company should be providing,” she says.

Umutoni also adds that a job is a scam when people recruit you or the boss’s identity is not clear.

"When the identities are not clear it is a big red flag, because when a company is registered the people working in it also will be registered and will be identified anywhere,”

In an article on Umurava, an online market, they share some tips to identify when a job is a scam. It’s probably a scam if;

"No experience is necessary, no education needed, no skills needed.”

A genuine job interview is not required. A minimal fake interview can be done very quickly via text message, Skype, or email.

When you Google them, you find only job postings or warnings.

If contact with them is only via e-mail to an address at gmail.com or some other e-mail service not associated with the business, it is a scam.