⚠️ Beware of Job Seeker Scams and Bad Practices: What You Need to Know ⚠️

⚠️Job seeker scams and bad practices to be aware of...⚠️

I've just been reading a LinkedIn post from a job seeker who was making fellow job seekers aware of the perils of the 'Open To Work' badge and the subsequent plethora of unsolicited sales messages and scams.

We run a regular webinar about some of the biggest recruitment scams (and how to avoid them) so I thought it might be useful to list some of the things to be aware of:

1. Vacancy crashing i.e., recruiters advertising roles they are not mandated to recruit for in the hope they'll find a couple of perfect candidates that they can use as a tool to get a foot in the door with the employer.

2. People pretending to be recruiters, and advertising fake roles with the sole objective of selling various job seeker-related services (not to be confused with legitimate recruiters that sell or recommend career services where appropriate).

3. Financial scams where job seekers are asked to pay upfront for training materials or background checks.

4. Recruiters using job seekers' CVs as a marketing tool. Always use your LinkedIn profile as a shield when approached by recruiters until you can ascertain a genuine bona fide vacancy that you are a suitable candidate for.

5. Scammers masquerading as recruiters with the sole aim of obtaining personal or sensitive (financial) information.

6. Companies claiming to have access to unadvertised senior-level vacancies and charging several thousand quid to access them (but not delivering any results).

7. Companies offering job seekers a CV scan to assess how ATS optimised their CV is. In some cases, these can be genuine and useful, but remember these scanning tools are not ATS, they are just scanning tools. The only way to assess how well your CV is optimised is to run it through a proper ATS for a specific vacancy.

Of course, there are some very reputable recruiters and career service providers out there. Just do your due diligence and be careful.

Stay safe out there.

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