Wednesday, November 30, 2011

The Truth About Work At Home Companies

If you turn on the T.V, or open up a newspaper you are likely to find an ad for a work at home company. These schemes are on the rise and you can find them almost anywhere, from the telephone pole flyers, to television commercials. These advertisements promise anything from a few bucks made on the side, to instant wealth and quick cash. But one has to ask the obvious question: Do these companies really deliver on their promises?

Caution should be exerted when looking into one of these advertisements. Most of these get rich quick plots, and work from home companies are just con artists looking to scam you out of your money. Most of the time you notice too late what has happened, and that these ads have left out some very important facts. They may have left out the fact that you will have to work many many hours to get the job done, and with out pay sometimes too. Some even charge fees which they do not disclose beforehand in their ads. Lying by omission is how most scams get into the business to begin with.

An unperceived number of work at home companies require their applicants to spend their own money to place newspaper ads, make photocopies, or buy envelopes, paper, stamps, and other supplies or equipment which they will need in order to perform their jobs. Sometimes, these work at home companies may even demand that you pay an additional amount for the instructions or "tutorial" software for training so you will be able to do your job properly. What they fail to say however is that this "training" or "instructions" that they speak of is actually available elsewhere, free of charge. Many consumers who have been deceived by the ads ran by these work at home companies have lost thousands of dollars. What's more, all their time and effort that they invested on the schemes went down the drain.

Some classic schemes to look out for are things like:

Medical Billing: Companies pitch that there is a crisis in health care. The ads will say that in order to save money, doctors are looking for outside people to take care of paper work and billing over the internet. Such a job promises easy case, and lots of it, but what they will fail to mention is that you have to start the business on your own, gathering clients, advertising and generating revenues all on your own.

Envelope Stuffing: Work at home companies will ask you for a fee so that they will be able to send you "instructions" that tell you how to stuff envelopes and make money. But you will later realize that these instructions are actually the same ad you have received that they will tell you to send out in order to draw more people into the scam.

Funny Ways To Save Money

There was a list of funny ways to save money on a "frugal living" website. They weren't necessarily meant to be funny, but were gleaned from real suggestions sent in. Some cheapskates don't seem to notice that an extra hour at work might put them further ahead than many hours of penny-pinching.

The following are real suggestions, and then there are some funny ways to save money that you really shouldn't try.

Funny Ways To Save Money - The Real Suggestions

One person suggested ways to save money on weddings that included picking up the leftover flowers at a cemetery. I'm not sue how you can tell which are "leftovers."

Another creative penny pincher found a way to save money on a car wash. He washed his entire car using the squeegee at the gas station.

A woman confessed that she has the kids stuff their pockets with the free ketchup, salt and other condiment packets every time they were in a fast food restaurant. That's not all, though. She actually had the kids squeeze ketchup and mustard from the packets into regular jars of ketchup and mustard, and claims she hasn't bought these condiments in years.

To save money on an umbrella, one man suggests going to the lost and found department of any large public library. Tell them you lost a black umbrella. They will have several, from which you can pick the best one and claim it as your own.

Call people long-distance when you know they won't be home. Leave a message for them to call. That way, they pay for the long-distance call.

Funny Ways To Save Money - Don't Try This At Home

Don't pay baby sitters! Get young couples who are thinking about having kids to "rent" yours for the evening. They get to see what it will be like, and you can get paid instead of paying for sitters.

Turn off the TV and all the lights to save electricity. Tell the kids it's a game of hide-and-seek.

Train your dog to beg for food from strangers, so you won't have to buy dog food.

Rub pine needles under your arms instead of buying deodorant.

Take extra napkins from fast food restaurants to save on toilet paper.

Borrow your neighbors toothbrush instead of buying your own.

If I write a book on ways to save money, funny or not, will I make much in sales, or will everyone take my suggestion and borrow it from the library instead of buying it?