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Watch Out for Genealogy Scams!

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The internet is full of wonderful resources for genealogists. Unfortunately, it also has quite a few websites that are cleverly designed scams, that you could end up falling for if you don’t watch out. Some of the scam websites are designed to fool people who are new to genealogy, and may not know any better. First, let’s start with a quick lesson on internet safety. You are going to need to be very careful about the websites that you type your credit card information into. Never send your credit card number to a person or company that randomly sent you … Continue reading →

Scam Alert: All Mystery Shopping Opportunities Are Not Created Equal

In my quest to learn more about the different home-based business scams that are out there, I came across yet another scam that lures people in by appearing to be something that it is not. This scam involves “mystery shoppers” or “secret shoppers”. It is important to note that people can and do work as secret shoppers, performing important quality-control work for the businesses that they are hired to shop at, dine at, or otherwise patronize. The mystery shopping scam starts out just like you are applying to a legitimate mystery shopping job. You see or hear an advertisement and … Continue reading →

It’s Criminal – A Home-Based Business Scam That Can Get You In Trouble

In many of the common work-at-home scams, the victims of the scam lose their hard-earned money that they put into the so-called “business opportunity”. While that on its own is terrible, there are some home-based business scams that can cause even worse things to happen to those people that are unfortunate enough to have become involved in them. Re-shipping is a phony “business opportunity” that gets its participants involved in moving stolen property. Not only do you not make any money if you fall for this scam, you could get in trouble with the law. There are a few ways … Continue reading →

Online Romance Scams

This afternoon Wayne surprised me and came home from work early. Thank goodness I had just woken up from my nap. He’d tease me mercilessly if he found me conked out on the couch. (He thinks that’s what I do all day as it is, which I do sometimes, but not always. But he’d never believe me if he actually caught me in the act.) At any rate, he’d had CPE (Continuing Professional Education) training for half the day. Instead of going in to the office for only a few hours, he opted to skip the drive and come home … Continue reading →

Beware of Free Group Scams

While it is good to be frugal, more and more con artists are popping up to take advantage of people who are frugal. There is a lot of focus on frugality right now, and the bad guys know this. Be on the look out for free group scams, especially if you are new to the frugal living lifestyle. Free group scams are modeled after legitimate free, trading and sharing groups. The good groups let you give away items you don’t want for free, get items you need for free, and trade your existing non-wanted items for other items that you … Continue reading →

Travelers’ Checks Scam

My mother swears by travelers’ checks. They are a vital part of her travel itinerary: make airline reservations, pack toothbrush, pick-up travelers’ checks… If you routinely use travelers’ checks –be warned–you could be a target for scam artists. The scam involves a computer and a person who plays on the sympathy of vacationers who are regularly use travelers’ checks. It starts with an email message asking for help cashing travelers’ checks. The person sending the email claims to be stranded in another country and is unable to use his/her travelers’ checks. The email plays on the emotions of travelers who … Continue reading →

BEWARE—The Holiday Gift Card Scam

I don’t know where you live, but if you reside anywhere around the Midwest portion of the United States then you may have heard about a new scam involving gift cards. Thousands of victims have flooded area Better Business Bureaus with their tragic stories of being ripped off. Here’s how the scam works: Scammers go to a store where gift cards are hanging on a rack. They then copy numbers and merchant names from these gift cards. They wait a week or so and then call the 800 number that was on the back of the card to find out … Continue reading →

BEWARE! New Mail Scam

I have blogged about mail scams in the past, but it never fails to break my heart when I hear about elderly people getting scammed out of thousands of dollars. If you have an elderly parent, grandparent, uncle, friend or neighbor who lives alone you may want to warn them about a new mail scam that targets senior citizens. Authorities in New Jersey say that a number of senior citizens have fallen prey to a mail scam that has robbed seniors nationwide of more than $500,000. According to the head of the Senior Task Force for a New Jersey prosecutor’s … Continue reading →

Managing Your Time

One of the struggles that I find a lot of people have who work from home is managing their time. When you aren’t under the careful observation of a boss it can be too easy to get stuck in the vicious cycle of time wasters. You know what I mean…checking your email every few minutes, picking up around the house, watching Dr. Phil. Recently I started really paying attention to the things I spend time doing in between my work. I knew I wasn’t managing my time well because there were just too many evenings that I still had to … Continue reading →

Not Really One of My Relatives

Don’t you just hate it when you get a bunch of spam email, that fills up your inbox? I’m not sure what about it annoys me the most: the little bit of extra time it takes to delete it, or the disappointment I feel when I discover that it wasn’t an email from a friend or relative after all. Recently, I got a spam email from a bank that had a sum of money waiting for me, left there by a distant relative. If only that were true! We all have heard about the typical email scams that have been … Continue reading →