Still Struggling to Work at Home

I received the following e-mail from my step mother yesterday regarding her continued search to find Work at Home. I thought that it was important to share with everyone and remember always look for the fine print.

I will also say that even though the fees were a surprise everything I have read on the Internet states that Arise is a legitimate work at home business click here for more information.

Lets look at the fees one by one and put this work at home business into perspective:

* Background Check - $13 or $26 (Most work at home companies expect you to pay for your own background check, this is standard.

* Incorporation - $100 +/- (Arise is unique in they expect all their home works to be incorporated, however this will save you one tax money at the end of the year and personal liability if you are sued.)

* High Speed ISP - $100 +/- (Most people already have this)

* Phone Equipment & Dedicated Line - $185 +/- (Arise accepts incoming calls for Walt Disney, I can understand why they want a dedicated line for incoming calls and I think the $185 is a bit high, I only pay $46 a month for unlimited calling)

* ACP101 Basic Certification Course - $99 (This certification weeds out the people that are serious about work at home and ensures that everybody knows what they are doing before excepting phone calls. Be warned the passing grade needed for the tests at the end of the course is 90 and if you fail, you have to take the course over again and yes that is another $99.)

* Client Specific Certification Course $50 - $225 - please see the Arise website at www.arise.com under the heading "Have Freedom" then select the FAQ's for more information on Client Specific Certification Courses.

* 24/7 Arise Technical Support & Service Desk - $39.50 per month, per each of your employees/ACPs. This is paid by the VSC in two semi monthly payments of $19.75 per pay period. This fee does not commence until your VSC commences to service its first client and is only paid when a VSC is actively servicing. (Basically this is your support line. The company is getting you clients and processing your payments and making sure you get paid. I think that is worth $40 a month.)

Arise seems to be legitimate and when thinking about starting your own business looking at these fees they seem fair and a fairly cheap way to get your own business going.

Anyway here is the e-mail from my step mother and the message from Arise.

Adele,

I thought this may be something you may want to check out, if not for
anything else perhaps to use as a heads up tool on your blog. After seeing
Arise.com on the CNN website I looked into it. Looked good, so I took all
of my assessment tests, passed and did my background check. After passing
all of that then I found that it would cost $99 to take the ACP(Arise
Certified Professional) course which I hadn't taken notice of prior but I
really didn't feel that that was horrible. I talked with your dad about
this and he was hesistant on it so I hadn't done it. I'm glad I didn't
because I didn't realize all of these other expenses you will see in this
email that were involved with the process. I went back to the Arise website
and still can not see where they are listed or spoken of. Still may be
there and maybe I have overlooked an area or read too quickly but I am glad
now that he didn't give me the go ahead on it as these are a lot of expenses
I feel and if I had moved too quickly now I'd be faced with go ahead or be
out $99 for the ACP course. Just a thought as in these times people may be
too anxious to make the money and not realize what expenses they could be
incurring.

----- Original Message -----
From: "Admissions"
To:
Sent: Thursday, February 26, 2009 3:41 PM
Subject: Arise Contact Form


Dear Julie,

Thank you for contacting Arise! The Arise business model is based on a
business to business relationship. As a result, Arise will only contract
with incorporated entities ("Virtual Services Corporations" or "VSCs") to
provide service.

In your capacity as the chief executive officer of your VSC, you will have
the flexibly to select the hours that you desire to service on behalf on
behalf of your VSC. VSCs are compensated by Arise for services rendered in
any one of three ways - per call, per talked minute or per hour. Any of the
foregoing methods for compensating VSCs should result in an average hourly
rate of between $10 and $14 per hour.

One lump sum direct deposit is received per Virtual Services Corporation
directly from Arise. This is received semi-monthly on the 7th and 22nd of
each month (the exception is if this date falls on a weekend or bank
holiday, it will then default to the following business day). Arise will
only pay the VSC, payment will not come directly from any Client the VSC is
servicing. The VSC will receive an Invoice that breaks down how much each
individual earned for that pay period for each application (should they be
servicing more than one Client Application). Arise does not withhold any
state, local or federal taxes from the payment made to your VSC. A 1099
Earnings Statement will be issued to the VSC at the end of the tax year.
The Owner of the VSC will be responsible for earnings statements being sent
to the employees of that VSC.

As with starting any new business, there are costs involved. Below, we have
broken down the costs (assuming your PC is already compatible). These
numbers are on the high end; you may discover the actual cost is not as high
as the estimates.

The average investment ranges from $400 to $600 assuming that you already
have a computer that meets Arise's minimum technology requirements. This
covers the:

* Background Check - $13 or $26
* Incorporation - $100 +/-
* High Speed ISP - $100 +/-
* Phone Equipment & Dedicated Line - $185 +/-
* ACP101 Basic Certification Course - $99
* Client Specific Certification Course $50 - $225 - please see the Arise
website at www.arise.com under the heading "Have Freedom" then select the
FAQ's for more information on Client Specific Certification Courses.
* 24/7 Arise Technical Support & Service Desk - $39.50 per month, per each
of your employees/ACPs. This is paid by the VSC in two semi monthly payments
of $19.75 per pay period. This fee doe not commence until your VSC commences
to service its first client and is only paid when a VSC is actively
servicing.

Should you have additional questions regarding this or any other Arise
Admissions issue, you may reach us by calling 1.866.771.0041 or you may
email admissions@arise.com.

Thank you,

* * * * *
Arise Admissions Department
Arise Virtual Solutions Inc.
3450 Lakeside Drive, Suite 620
Miramar, Florida 33027
866.771.0041, option 1, Monday-Friday 10am-5pm EST
www.arise.com
KW
NOTICE: The information contained in this electronic mail transmission is
intended by Arise Virtual Solutions, Inc. for the use of the named
individual or entity to which it is directed and may contain information
that is privileged or otherwise confidential. If you have received this
electronic mail transmission in error, please delete it from your system
without copying or forwarding it, and notify the sender of the error by
reply email or by telephone (collect), so that the sender's address records
can be corrected.

Struggling to Find Work at Home

My step-mother has decided that she wants to work at home. Considering that I run this site I thought this was the perfect opportunity for me to the follow the process of someone looking to work at home full time.

I sent her a couple of links from my site of places that host jobs for work at home contractors. These sites include

oDesk is freelance company, you will receive a profile and an online resume. The best part is you will also receive an e-mail address and a secure log in. You will also receive software to install on your computer so oDesk can track your time and bill for it accordingly.

Get A Freelancer help you find customers from all over the world! It's free to sign up.

Then I sent her the article that I wrote back in January, http://www.wahjs123.com/2009/01/10-companies-that-hire-home-agents.html

I do not have a complete list of sites that she has joined to get contracting positions, however I can tell you that a couple of "interviews" that she has had are suspicion. One interview involved not talking to a person, but joining 4 dating service web sites. To me this is not an interview and the person or company that told her that it was, just earned a commission off her signing up and she has not heard back from them since, to me that is scam, just like the people that take your money for programs that don't work.

Sometime being scammed does not involve losing money.

ClixSense Stimulus Package!

For those of you who are not clixsense members:

Clixsense is a paid to surf program that allows you to earn a little bit of extra money by visiting advertisers web sites. Yes they really do pay, via check once a month.

To learn more click here.

For all you clixsense members I receive the below e-mail today:

ClixSense is offering our own version of the "Stimulus Package"! This is designed to save money for advertisers which will in turn put more money into the pockets of our surfing members...

Advertisers - purchase hits on ClixSense without any surcharge! That's right, ClixSense will waive it's fee for advertising from the time of this email, through midnight Sunday (US CST). That means every penny you spend on advertising goes straight into the viewers account! Your advertising dollar goes further, and members are rewarded more!

You see it everyday as you browse paid ads on ClixSense, ads that say such things as:

"Guaranteed Traffic Builder"
"The only real program that works"
"The secret to Internet Marketing"
"Marketing Guru Tells All"

What does that tell you? It should tell you that the one thing that DOES work is advertising on ClixSense! If the program they are promoting is so great, why aren't they using their own technique instead of trying to sell it to you?

ClixSense is a tried and proven advertising method which allows advertisers to reach real and targeted traffic by rewarding the consumer for viewing their ad rather than paying a so called "Marketing Guru" or never heard of advertising agency.

Many advertisers have tried keyword marketing through the major search engines only to find that keyword bidding has gotten way out of hand and not affordable. With ClixSense, you pay as little as one cent for each real visitor to your website. ClixSense doesn't charge for "impressions" or any other "advertising hype". We deliver real customers right to your website!

Since the time ClixSense appeared online a few years ago, there have been many sites attempting to imitate our success. These sites try to throw every gimmick under the sun at you in an attempt to bring traffic to their sites. Here are some of the gimmicks they try and why they don't work:

1: You get paid for the ads your downline views - Trash! Why would any advertiser want to pay someone who doesn't ever see their ad? Sure, this rewards the surfers, but not the advertiser and is the #1 reason advertisers don't advertise on those sites. What good comes from surfing a site with no ads?

2. Package Priced Ads - Trash! These sites sell fixed price advertising. For example, they may sell 1,000 hits for $16.00. The real reason behind this is that they don't have the membership base to allow advertisers to purchase larger quantities of traffic. They recycle the ad to the very same traffic that has already seen the ad. As an advertiser, you want to reach as many unique and responsive prospects as possible. ClixSense has the membership base others only dream of!

3. Selling Referrals - MAJOR TRASH! Where do you think these members came from? These sites rely on referrals to build their sites in the first place! These are fake accounts which were generated by scammer members opening multiple accounts to cheat the advertisers out of their advertising dollars. The inexperienced site owners then sell these fake accounts to you as "referrals". At ClixSense every member is referred by someone else. Our member accounts are real which doesn't leave any unreferred members to be sold. Word of mouth is the best form of advertising. ClixSense gains all new members by referral only as we do not do any outside advertising for new members.

4. Instant Payouts - More Trash! This one has a lot to do with the "Selling Referrals" as discussed above. Sites that attempt to make payouts to their members through an electronic payment processor usually aren't around very long. The reason is because most payment processors allow users to use multiple email addresses to receive payments. This allows for one person to open multiple surf accounts and get paid for the ads they view on each one. Again, advertisers want to reach real people to view their websites! Not the same person viewing their ad 4 or 5 times just to get paid for each time they view it.

5. PayPal Payments - Beware! Any of these sites using PayPal for payments is certainly doomed for failure. PayPal does not process payments for "Paid to Click" type websites. It usually isn't long before PayPal freezes the admins account along with your money - the money you earned for clicking ads on their sites. In fact, there are many risks to your own PayPal account. You should also be weary of any of the other "fly by night" processors these sites use. ClixSense pays it's members by check on time month after month.

Did you know the average life of a "Paid to Click" type site is only three months? The reasons above is why! ClixSense is on it's third year in business. Our business model is set up for fairness and success. We don't "hype" things that don't work, and we aren't running some "copycat" script. The ClixSense site was developed in house by an experienced e-commerce staff.

The ClixSense support staff maintains a 4.5 out of 5 customer satisfaction rating. Our staff is here to provide support to our members anytime of the day. Help desk tickets are usually responded to in just a matter of minutes during our normal business hours. This is because ClixSense has an in-house staff. ClixSense is not a one person operation being ran on the side of a regular job. ClixSense is our job and our job is serving our members.

Virtual Juror

I don't know about you, but I love shows like Law and Order and CSI, I think they are great. I found these four sites, that will actually pay you to review their cases and then give you opinion as a layman.

As a Work at Home option, being an online juror will not make you rich and will not replace your full time job, but it is fun and an easy way to earn extra money from home.

These are the four sites that I have found, the average pay is $3.00 per case and it is paid directly to your paypal account. :D

eJury.com http://www.ejury.com/
Online Verdict.com http://www.onlineverdict.com/
Trial Practices, Inc. http://www.trialpractice.com/
ZapJury http://www.zapjury.com/

Please note that if you have a legal background or if you work for a law firm, you will not be able to join these sites.

Googlizer Method

I received an e-mail early last week about a new program called the Googlizer. Apparently I can start making $1,000 to $7,000 a month using this simple tool. So I went to the web page and it had a lot of useful information, and guess what the program was free!

So I entered my first name, e-mail address and state and waiting to get the information e-mailed to me. The first three e-mails that I receive from the company had useful information about working at home and starting a home business.

Today I finally got the Googlizer Method. So I went to the web site and they said for just $1 shipping and handling they would mail me everything I need to start making money with google. When I clicked on the link I found that they were just selling the Google Money Tree program. How disappointing. Back in December of 2008 I reviewed the Google Money Tree program, http://www.wahjs123.com/2008/12/google-money-tree-program-its-free-or.html and found that it was not as free as they advertise.

Sorry looks like this one is a bust too.

ISCL Independent Shopper's Company Ltd

I received a letter in the mail today with a bid fat check! That's right a check for $3,405.00. The letter accompanying the check informed me that since I was a member of Earn Cash for Survey, which yes I do belong too, I was selected for a special mystery shopper job.

The letter instructed me to call 905-616-5531 to activate the check and then complete my assignment. My assignment included cashing the check and then going shopping at Walmart and send a Money Gram in the amount of $2,950 to Mary Samuel, Calgary, Alberta Canada. Then report back on my experiences.

None of this seems legitimate to me, so I decided to research it. My first step was to research the company on the check itself. The I searched on ISCL Independent Shoppers Company LTD., and this is what I found out about the company:

It’s a combination of employment fraud and a wire-transfer scam. You may answer an ad in the newspaper, or get a letter in the mail, like I did. It involves a bank check and a simple assignment. The check may appear to be very official looking and be accompanied with instructions on what to do with it.

Usually, you’ll cash the check, say for $3000, and then wire the sum of $2600 to an address provided. You will keep the remaining $400 and submit a report on the whole process. Was it good? Did it go smoothly? How was the customer service?

Other versions of the scam ask you to cash the check, use the Western Union service at a local store, such as a Walmart, and then send some of that money to a given address. Again, you keep the difference for yourself. The “shopper” is also put under extreme pressure to do the whole assignment in 2 days or less, for obvious reasons. And you can guess what happens.

The check bounces and the mystery shopper is left out of pocket. Sometimes, it can be five-figure damage. These guys look and sound like the real deal, complete with corporate stationery and professional websites.

Don't fall for it. I have sent an e-mail to the company that the check was issued from informing them that I received the check and I did not believe that it was real. I will post when/if I get a response from them.