Things to watch out for -- scams ...

[Cheryl@WAHM.com]

What should people who are looking to start a crafting business, or do craft work, watch out for?

What are some of the scams you've found?

[dmoradi]

The biggest problem I have run into is marketing.Specifically search engine submission companies that don't follow thru, and "campaigner" programs.(Some of them are legitimate-if you really want to advertise in India or some other country).This is not only for crafters but for anyone with an online business.


The other problem I have had is not really a scam but a pain in the neck.lol The marketing for health insurance and other types of business services either calling,emailing etc. for unsolicited offers.


Lately, I have had a flood of emails from Nigeria wanting to purchase American made products on an "LC". (An LC stands for Letter of Credit) This can be a legitimate or not (mostly not with current buying practices) way to purchase, however, if something goes wrong-be aware that due to trade restrictions you may not have any recourse!

[BarbaraS]

If you have a store online:


I just had a large order from a man in GB to be shipped to Gambia. I am sure this was a scam. When I tried to email him it bounced back. He payed with cc but I didn't process it.


If it looks to good to be true, it probably is.


I am sure there was some cc scam that went along with it.


Be careful of overseas orders.

[dmoradi]

I got an FBI alert from another group I belong to.There is a scam going around with foreign orders, particularly Nigerian and S Africa.


They offer to purchase your item for far more than your asking price ,send you aphony cashiers check,then they ask you to send them the balance in USD. DON'T DO IT. The checks they are sending you are worthless and do not clear the bank.


It gets a little sticky customer service wisefor those of us who do ship worldwide and have legitimate foreign customers. What we ALWAYS do with foreign orders is wait to make sure funds clear the bank first and then ship.Legitimate customers understand this, will only send you the exact amount of the purchase,and it is an accepted procedure in the international business community.

[dmoradi]

For those of you who want to trade internationally, but are not quite sure what the rules are, here is a good source of information:


http://ita.doc.gov/td/industry/otea/usfth/


If you have particular questions, contact your area congressional office or senator's office. They have full time staffers who are there to answer questions or (provide assistance in finding the answer). They also offer help with lotsofother issues,and it is a free service.

[SherryB]

oh lets see i was scammed a few years ago do the envelpoe stuffing thought i could help my family in turne al i got was [img]smileys/smiley35.gif[/img]by dishonest people.

[chromegrrrl]

Not all, but most assemble products at home are scams. Two in
particular that did pay out the products were so detailed and labor
intensive and the pay out so low that I ended up only making back my
set up money and quitting, one was doll-house furniture and the other
was beaded earrings-- both legit, but both were not worth the time.



The doll house furniture bothered me because it was advertised that you
could do this work with as little as glue, x-acto knife, and sandpaper.
It would have taken *days* for each piece without powertools.



Pre-internet era-- The worst assemble at home scam was a book-binding
company that wanted pay for the kit, pay for the "training" (mostly
videos on bookbinding), then upgrade the kit, then had you send a large
deposit for each 'job', then would 'refund' your deposit money for the
job but not pay out mailing, pay, etc because your work was rejected
(they kept the finished bound book too). If you complain enough to them
they will pay you for smaller jobs, less than the agreed upon amount
but enough for a 'rejected' book.



I found out that a friend was a victim on the other side of the scam,
an author that had self published-- those printed pages we were sent
were vanity books, the authors told that there were thousands of
printings, and the hand-bound ones were the 'master' manuscripts for
the authors. Once we confronted them they just got weird, piling on
lies, and calling in the middle of the night demanding to speak to our
family's legal counsel right NOW (yeah, we keep a lawyer in the closet,
throw him a little ham when he's hungry and wake him up when someone
wants to talk to him at 3 am!)



They even sent a registered letter to my parents (I was under 18 at the
time) saying that its common knowlege that writers on the whole were
drug adled liars and that they were concerned for my welfare if I
continued associating with this writer friend of mine-- it was kind of
a sideways threat implying that they'd report my parents for being
neglectful and abusive if we continued pursuing them (this letter also
included a partial refund for the 'professional' kit and payment for
the two 'rejected' jobs)



My friend never got so much as a bad check from them, although she was
on the end of the same weird abusive behavior. I think the
CEO?owner?company legal counsel was all the same person, and that the
receptionist/answering service was his wife, they operated out of
Florida and occassionally still pop up with vanity press scams.



Its actually a shame that they didn't have a professional company
produce the book binding videos-- because they could have made a lot
more money legitimately by selling those, they had some tips and
techniques on binding that I've never seen anywhere else and work so
well.

[Ditch]

Well just to add a little bit here, just yesterday I was watching Dr. Phil and they were discussing men from Nigeria who meet woman online then scam them for $$. Doing the exact thing, sending money orders and them not clearing the bank etc. etc. So ya I wouldn't be sending anything to anybody like that.

[PhilC]

Originally Posted by dmoradi

The biggest problem I have run into is marketing.Specifically search engine submission companies that don't follow thru ...

This applies toeveryone who has a website forbusiness:-


Never ever pay for search engine submissions!


I'm a search engine optimiser (SEO), and I can tell you that it isnever necessary to submit a website to the search engines these days. It can be done, but it's unnecessary. The best, and quickest, way to get a website indexed by the search engines is to get a few links pointingto the site from other websites that are already in the engines' indexes- and wait. It doesn't take long for the mainengines' crawlers to come around. Paying for someone else to submit a site to the engines is a complete waste of money.


If you don't know how to get other sites linking to yours, submit your site to some directories.There's aa large list of suitable directories at http://info.vilesilencer.com/main.php?rock=seo-friendly-list .php


But when your site is indexed by the engines, don't expect it to rank highly in the search results. Many people expect the engines to rank their sites highly for relevant searchterms, just becausethe site exists, and it's easy to think that a submission service failed to follow through when the site doesn't rank highly.Search enginesdon't work like that. For many sites, especially those that have a significant amount of competition in their fields, it is essential to do what is known as 'search engine optimization' for it to compete for the high rankings. That'scompletely different to submission services.Some search engine optimizationbasics can be found at http://www.webworkshop.net/search-engine-optimization-basics .html


Edited by: PhilC

[IrishLove21]

But NEC is a good company right? I am just looking for ways to work home and not lose money.