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The Privacy Dilemma -- "Workopolis: your resume has been selected"

The first week in Feb was one of my most stressful weeks in Carleton. I was busy applying for co-op jobs, preparing for tests while meeting assignment deadlines. I'm sure the thought in your head is, "Duh! You are in university". Yeah I know, but this week felt different.

Friday night, I attended a vigil, every prayer point and every word from the man of God felt like they were directed to me. He said, "God would send you a man that would assist you to achieve that which God has predestined for you" and I believed it. On returning home, I received an email on my blackberry. I unlocked my phone to read it and the first thing I saw was "Workopolis: your resume has been selected". I was overwhelmed with joy. I hadn't opened the message but something within me said I had a reason to rejoice. I remember thinking to myself, "God has sent me a man already?" Once I finally cooled down, I decided to read the message.... it was a job offer! My heart skipped a beat as I read each word of this message. It felt like a potential heart attack UNTIL I reached the JOB DESCRIPTION portion which read: 

APPLY NOW

JOB DESCRIPTION Agent's work consists in receiving payments from our customers in Canada and making further payments as instructed to a regional affiliate department, depending on the customer's location. Being a part-time job, it should not take more than 2 hours per day. Agent's commission is 10% from each transaction (for instance: you receive CAD1,000.00, you will keep CAD100.00 as payment for your service). All further money transfer charges and fees are covered by our company. So you will be responsible just for making proper payments in time. Each transaction will be made only after prior notification by phone call or e-mail.B

Did you notice the B at the end of the job description? Companies pay a lot of money to advertize jobs, typos aren't very professional now or are they? Well, that was the first thing that caught my eye followed by the thought that "why would a company pay so much for part-time service?". I managed to brush away the thought by convincing myself it could be God reaching out to me.... so I continued reading..... Then I saw the biggest shocker!! 

You are not required to: Have any extra knowledge or to be experienced in this business and this occupation can endow additional income to you and your family as it will not require more than few hours per week. If you are interested in our offer, please feel free to ask for the general provisions of the contract. PAYMENT/SALARY The payment system if flexible and easy for everyone.Each Executive Financial Manager will receive a monthly base salary of CAD2,000, plus a 10% commission from each transaction processed

Financial Agent Requirements: 

1) Only Canadian residents
2) One of the following :

- Chequing account ( existing RBC account only )

- Chequing account ( any bank , you will be receiving Interac E-mail Money Transfers from our customers )

- Credit Card ( the customers will be sending payments directly to your credit card )

For further information and inquiries about the job offering, please feel free to
contact us by e-mail at any time at… (I cut out the email address)

A job where you need no experience but pays that much in a month? Really? I looked up the company online and it said the company has had no transaction in the past 12 months (an operating company that is in the process of hiring workers hasn't been active for that long) For those who know me well, you can guess what I did next. :) Yep, I applied for the job... I just had to see this to the end. I replied to the email address that was attached to the email and within 24 hrs (or a bit more) I received a reply from douglas,taylor.recruiter@gmail.com. Never in my short life on this earth have I heard or gotten a message from a recruiter using Gmail. The email repeated a lot of info that was already made available on the job description but a particular part spoke to me:

"As soon as you'll let us know what requirement you're applying for, we'll send you the contract and you can start receiving payments tomorrow.

Your duties as our employee will be to receive payments / investments in your bank account and, once the money are clear, forward them by Western Union to our main office in London.Your 10% commission are to be deducted from the amount sent in your account, and the Western Union fees must be deducted from the remaining 90%.Your commission is 10% from each transaction (payment fees and taxes are covered in totality by our company).
Depending on the amount of time available for this job, you might process several transactions per day, boosting your income"

Western union?????????? When I saw that, it just sealed the deal for me. At this point, there was no doubt in my mind that this is some kind of scam and I wondered, who is to blame? Job seekers who respond to such job offers or Workopolis?

It can be argued that job seekers have the responsibility of conducting research on companies before applying to them. However, the simple truth is many people don't. Another argument is, shouldn't Workopolis screen jobs recruiters put up on its website? Shouldn't it look into the legitimacy of jobs before releasing resumes? These arguments raise the issue of online privacy. Who is responsible for protecting personal information posted online? Imagine how many people may fall prey to this. Luckily, you won't be one of them because now you know but imagine how many more of this is out there in different forms.

I guess the moral of all this is, don't get too carried away, and don’t be too quick to apply to jobs or get into any kind of transaction without doing proper research. If it doesn't look right, sound right, or feel right, 99% of the time, it isn't right.

Olaide Komolafe

Account Manager,

petGRO Industries.