by Jennifer Moll

Created on: March 23, 2009

If you search for "work from home" in your browser, you will literally come up with millions of hits. Now all you will have to do is try to decide which ones are legitimate opportunities that will allow you to make money from working at home and weed out the ones that are scams. Sounds easy enough, right? You couldn't be more wrong!

The following tips will help you decide which work at home jobs are safe for you to apply to and which ones to steer clear of.

1. If a company asks you to pay any type of fee, it is a scam! No company will require any type of fee, no matter what they try to call it to make it sound legitimate, it is not! An example of a job using this type of fee could be a data entry/typing job, the company many tell you that they are "weeding out the people that are not serious about working", or a job that will require you to put craft projects together for a company to buy back and you need to give them a "deposit" for the materials.

Both these cases are scams; in the situation of the data entry job you will simply receive a useless packet of information in the mail that will not allow you to make money at all. In the situation of the craft project job, the company will keep denying buying your completed project by stating that your completed craft does not meet their company's standard. Because you do not meet the company's standard, you do not meet the guidelines for the money back guarantee. In this case, you can still possibly make money if you so choose, by going to craft fairs and selling the products yourself or trying to sell online. But you will not be working from home as described.

2. Offers from companies stating you can make an unbelievable amount of money per hour or per year even without experience. So with the economy the way it is and so many people are losing their jobs, companies like these can really offer me $100 per hour with no experience? See how that sounds? A few examples can be to process rebates or applications online from home or envelope stuffing. Processing HUD rebates was a big one advertised not so long ago, but if you truly looked into the opportunity, it was against the law to receive money for processing a HUD rebate on behalf of someone. Envelope stuffing is not explained to you in its entirely, you need to pay to place an add in a newspaper or magazine, you get paid, when someone answers your ad and you submit their address to the company or they pay you for the type of information you may be selling. Another example is you can make $35.00 an hour plus at home as a medical transcriptionist without experience. All these ads will get you is signed up for a very costly course to learn medical transcription. Don't get me wrong, this can be a real at home career, but you do need experience to make decent money. If this career choice perks your interest, there are legitimate sites that can point you in the correct direction.

These are just a few tips to help keep you on the right path. It is very important for you to check out every opportunity before you decide. There are ads out there that really sound convincing; it is a good idea to check out any company on the Better Business Bureau.

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