Writers: How to Avoid Some of The Scams

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Writers: How to Avoid Some of The Scams

Posted on November 25th, 2009 in Writing by Louie Jerome

It is very easy to get cheated, even if you are an experienced writer.

Even experienced writers can get cheated by scam artists. I am too experienced to get taken in by those ‘earn $1000′ per article adverts, and promises to pay large sums for articles and ‘please send examples’. However, I did get cheated out of my fee by a couple of fraudsters who took my work and then ignored me. All writers should be aware of this.

Starting off a business as a freelance writer is not easy because there are many avenues open to the writer and the whole thing can be quite overwhelming. The price of advertising your skills is daunting and mistakes can be expensive. This is where the freelancers’ sites comes in. They do offer some protection if you stick to the rules.

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oDesk is an example of one of these websites dedicated to freelancers of all kinds and it allows professional and skilled people to advertise their abilities. The whole system works very smoothly and you can set yourself up as a freelance writer with a minimum of fuss and time.

What you need to do first is to register with the site because without this you can go no further. Then fill in your profile and go to the home page to select the category that you wish to be listed under. ‘Writing and Translation’ is the correct one for writing skills, but you can refine this listing by choosing from the list of sub categories in the drop down box, if you click on the main heading.

Add you listing in one, or even two sub categories if you wish. For example, you might select ‘speech writing’ and ‘web content’, or ‘proposal writing’ and ‘E books.’ The choice is yours. Make a selection and change it around if you want to.

Then comes the most important part; you will need to write an excellent advertisement telling prospective customers just how good you are. You are, after all, a writer, so you should be able to give yourself a glowing write up. Let everyone know where you are based and say that you want to work internationally too, as this will bring more work in. Give an idea of what you would charge to write and you are very quickly in business.

There are lots of freelance sites on the internet offering opportunities for writers but be careful and check out what you are doing before you start. I had a bad experience with one of these sites recently and I think it is worth mentioning as a warning.

I got a series of jobs from oDesk and everything was fine. I have to stress here that what happened was no fault of the oDesk site. It was my own fault for being gullible and trying to operate outside the system.

I did a couple of jobs for two particular ‘buyers’ and I was paid, so when they asked me if I wanted to be paid directly via Paypal, I said yes because it saved me paying a fee to withdraw my money from oDesk. At first I was paid, then I was offered bigger jobs and I took them. I didn’t get paid and there was nothing I could do. If I had stuck within the oDesk system I would have been able to let everyone know that I had been cheated through the feedback system, so I doubt that it would have happened.

Fortunately it was not a great deal of money that I lost but I did learn a valuable lesson. I cannot name the people who cheated me here, for obvious reasons but I will be extra cautious in future.

It really is worth joining a good freelancer site and working within their system. At least you have some protection that way and if you don’t get a fair deal, you can tell everyone using the feedback system.

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Tags: Freelance Writer, how not to get scammed, scammers at work, writing jobs, writing scams

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39 Responses to “Writers: How to Avoid Some of The Scams”

Patrick Bernauw
November 25th, 2009 at 5:14 am

Good advice!
Mysfit
November 25th, 2009 at 7:24 am

Oh..thanks for the warning.
Geri OHara
November 25th, 2009 at 7:41 am

Thank you for sharing your experience because trying to make a bit of headway in writing is a daunting (and sometimes energy draining) experience….and also sometimes quite frightful as you say there is so much out there it is not always easy to figure out genuine and honest possibilities.
simplyoj
November 25th, 2009 at 8:13 am

Thanks for sharing your experience and giving us the warning, this is useful specially to new freelance writers.
BeggarInTheSuit
November 25th, 2009 at 9:52 am

like this article and thank you for sharing your experience..
Athlyn Green
November 25th, 2009 at 10:08 am

A good rule of thumb is to never write sample articles, as you’ve mentioned. Scammers want free articles and use this as a way to get them. If someone asks for a “sample” tell them that you do not work for free and would be happy to provide same for compensation.
Sourav
November 25th, 2009 at 10:17 am

This is a good article. Thanks for the advice.
Lucas Dié
November 25th, 2009 at 10:31 am

Very valuable info, indeed.
Glynis Smy
November 25th, 2009 at 11:14 am

valuable article, thanks for sharing and warning.
Darlene McFarlane
November 25th, 2009 at 11:44 am

I can only repeat what so many have already said. You have given us some very valuable information. Thanks for the advice!
Michael Eboh
November 25th, 2009 at 12:45 pm

That means you have a long time experience about writing. I really appreciate this rich work. Thank you.
silversham
November 25th, 2009 at 1:07 pm

thanks for sharing these valuable experiences with us.
Louie Jerome
November 25th, 2009 at 1:56 pm

Thanks for the comments everyone. They are much appreciated. I just wish we could have a website full of scam sites and scam artists so that we could check out anything we were concerned about as writers, and add the culprits to the list, but unfortunately it can’t be done without risking a law suit.

They can steal our work but we cannot name them. Doesn’t seem fair, does it?
Tim P Stavert
November 25th, 2009 at 4:13 pm

A very valuable warning Jan, Thanks a lot and I will be on my guard.

Tim
Daniel
November 25th, 2009 at 4:44 pm

Good tips and advice.
Mark Gordon Brown
November 25th, 2009 at 5:04 pm

Good information. I enjoy writing, but the promotions are killing me. to be ripped off like that would piss me off!
craigz
November 25th, 2009 at 5:43 pm

Excellent advice
BeatsMe
November 25th, 2009 at 5:43 pm

Thanks for your warning and sharing your experience with us.
CA Johnson
November 25th, 2009 at 7:22 pm

Thank you so much for the good advice, louie. There are so many sites that try to take you for a ride. It’s easy to get tempted to write at different sites, but you do need to be careful. Sorry to hear that you had bad experience.
James DeVere
November 25th, 2009 at 7:43 pm

That’s great.

Also, Bukisa has an oDesk widget so you can see the freelance jobs without signing up to oDesk.

Cheers . j
Alexa Gates
November 25th, 2009 at 7:48 pm

Great advice… It’s a great to know that there is a site out there to protect writers rights. That’s a terrible experience though… I hope that doesn’t happen again
Sunandakundu
November 25th, 2009 at 10:28 pm

I have been writing for odesk buyers for over a year now. And just like you i have had great working experience so far. But I would like to share at this point, one of my bad experiences. this is quite recent and after reading your article i would really like to do something about it.

I took up a fixed price article writing job. where the buyer was new to odesk but his payment mode was verified. he wanted to have 3 articles within 24 hours and i wrote my first article and sent to him within a few hours and he acknowledged the same. but after a few hours when i sent him my second article I found that his payment mode verification was not working! and since this is a fixed price assignment odesk doesnt collect pay in advance.

Yes! i have been duped. he never responded to my numerous messages. And i learned my lesson. I am surely going to write a feedback where people like you and me can beware of such buyers.

Thanks!!
Liane Schmidt
November 26th, 2009 at 12:04 am

Thank you for your kind warning and sharing your experience!

Blessings.

Sincerely,

-Liane Schmidt.
AeDechavez
November 26th, 2009 at 3:20 am

helpful one ^^
haikumad
November 26th, 2009 at 3:29 am

Good advice.
shanthu
November 26th, 2009 at 3:42 am

thanks for the share….
janiek13
November 26th, 2009 at 6:39 am

Thanks for the advice. I wasn’t aware that Odesk charged a fee to withdraw your money. hmm
Shari86
November 26th, 2009 at 7:40 am

Excellent article, good advice. It is a pity you cannot name and shame the guilty party though!
Ramalingam
November 26th, 2009 at 11:28 am

Thanks for sharing your Odesk experience.It is always safe to be within the system and not to opt for fixed price projects and go for out of Odesk settlement.
SecondChance
November 26th, 2009 at 12:26 pm

Great article. Know your buyer.
abhishek40914
November 26th, 2009 at 3:03 pm

you are right even i found a site who paid for filling survey forms but after filing 7 they asked me to pay to get my money, weird! good article
Cheryl Malloy
November 26th, 2009 at 9:17 pm

Thanks for this lead on freelance writing – I am always looking for somewhere to go to find work. I had not heard of oDesk – so I am going to join up. Thanks for the warnings also!
Noodleman
November 26th, 2009 at 9:22 pm

Thanks for the advice. And why can’t you list here the people that scammed you? Then everyone would know to avoid them =)
Paul Faulkenham
November 26th, 2009 at 9:39 pm

Thanks for your advice. We writers can never get enough good advice and when it comes from a fellow writer it’s considered priceless. Thanks a lot.
strovek
November 26th, 2009 at 10:34 pm

Good article. Very informative.
seksijerk
November 27th, 2009 at 3:52 am

great piece of advice..thanks a lot…i am very new at writing and would like to try odesk and see how it goes.
metro7
November 27th, 2009 at 12:33 pm

gr8 advice n gr8 write up.thxs.
My Facebook
November 29th, 2009 at 11:03 pm

I really didn’t know about this site. I will definatly give it a try. Also thank you for the warnings of scams. I refer to prevent than experince it. So thank you.

Congrats for your 500th. Not sure exactly when so I maybe a little late. Apologies if so.
Borlok VA
December 2nd, 2009 at 6:06 pm

Hi Louie, Yes, there are many supposed buyers out there that are just itching to take advantage of not only writers, but any of the independent contractor fields that you might bid for. And yes, I too have learned not to take projects out of a freelance site for the same reason you cited above.

I’m glad to hear that you have had success with oDesk. I have steered away from them because I get a very uneasy feeling when reading that they see everything on my computer.

Thank you for a great article – well worth the read.