The Recruiting Racket

Oh, it’s almost Christmas so tis the season for a new scam. Because why not rip someone off right before Christmas with a scam… am I right?

I will give it to them; it was pretty convincing at first. The super flattering message telling me how I’m a perfect fit for a role that could be a promotion.  A nice increase in salary range… and just enough urgency to feel exciting.  But then came the plot twist.

My resume looked great, but if I truly wanted to impress the hiring manager, I would need to tweak my resume. So, here’s a name of a resume writer for the low, low price of anywhere from $150-500 bucks could almost guarantee me a new job. And oh, since you’re applying for the job and it’s a referral, they’ll move you to the top of the list for the services. Sweet!

And that’s when the lightbulb went off in my head – this was a sales funnel for resume writing services. Because it just didn’t make any sense. I wasn’t actively looking for another job, blasting my resume all over the place. And if the recruiter didn’t like my resume, then wouldn’t it be easier for HR/Hiring manager to say I’m not a good fit? Why go to the trouble when there are hundreds of people looking for new jobs?

It was because I wasn’t paying attention, I missed all the signs. And boy, they were all right in front of my face once I took a harder look. That said, I did end up having some fun at their expense… but I’ll get to that later.

What the Recruiter Did Right

Before I get into my epic fails to the many missed red flags, I want to preface it by saying that these scam artists of “recruiters” do a lot of things right.  And starting with flattery is never a bad idea. So here is a quick look at how they did make it look legitimate.

1. They used the company logo and a REAL recruiter’s name, her picture, signature, etc. into the email itself. So, in a quick check to see if this person was legit, it was easy to check LinkedIn and see there was someone who was recruiting at that company.
2. They tailored the job to my direct experiences and my ‘social influence.’ Add in a little bit more flattery and who wouldn’t want to do the same job for another 100-200k+ a year?
3. They were patient. It wasn’t right away I got the pitch. That for sure would have set off red flags. Instead, there was a little back and forth over a few days before I got the news, I needed to hire someone.
4. It’s not really an obvious scam if the resume writer actually provides the services. Think about it. I hired a resume writer. The writer updates my resume (probably spending two seconds using AI), and now I’m calling foul after I didn’t get the job or an interview.

How could you possibly pursue legal action against someone who was just doing their job (on both accounts including the person who is recruiting you)? The audacity of this recruiting scam is just infuriating on so many levels.

Recruiting Mistakes

Mistake #1 – Email Address. The almost close, (but not) official email address.  Had I actually paid attention and been serious about the job… I probably would have caught it a bit sooner. Especially given this is the number one red flag of any type of scam trying to look legit. (Insert face palm).

Mistake #2 – Time Zones – If we are located with 1 hour between CST and EST, why are you emailing me at 1:30 in the morning and not responsive until then? Yeah. You’re ‘recruiting’ for something else, that’s why.

Mistake #3 – Subject Line: NOTICE!! – After I figured out it was fake I ghosted both the recruiting agent and writer. Well, I guess the recruiter wasn’t too happy, since I got an email with the subject line screaming at me and telling me how I was getting passed over for the position if I didn’t follow up. Oh no. The horror.

Mistake #4 – Resume writer unknown – The website they did lead me to was super generic. No name, just links that follow back to the beginning of the site. And definitely wasn’t on LinkedIn.

Mistake #5 – The job description. Now, this is another point of contention that did start some of my confusion. Yes, the job posting leveraged all of my skills. But given my recent career change to support an ERP project, it made for a heck of mess of a job description. Which leads me to…

Mistake #6 – The job wasn’t posted on the company’s website. Whoopsies. Guess they are smart, but not smart enough to really put in the extra effort.

Having some fun with the recruiting racket

First let me start off by saying I reached out to the REAL recruiter to let her know that someone was using her image/likeness for this scam and she passed it along to her internal security team. I know if someone had catfished as me, I’d also want to know. But after that, is where the real fun began.

If someone was willing to waste my time with this recruiting scam, I figured I might as well return the favor. So once the recruiter sent me the URGENT notice, I let her know I couldn’t afford it and asked to borrow $500 bucks for the resume writing.

She declined to lend me the money until I got my ‘new job’ but did get me a 50% discount with the writer for services (how nice, right?). And then that’s where I asked if she thought the writer would like to get paid in learning how to trade Bitcoin (another annoying scam I’ve seen over and over).

I haven’t heard back about that … but figure they know the gig is up and are moving on to other targets. Which is why I wanted to write this post to get the word out there. Because the recruiting racket is just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to these sophisticated scams.

And sadly, we have entered into a time and place where you no longer can take anything at face value. Having to question every new interaction is a terrible way to live. But honestly, after all the different scams that are out there, it’s hard not to do. I think it’s just the new reality of not only the workplace, but a way of life.