What Work-At-Home Jobs Are All About

Joan’s Story

The Warning Signs: outsourcing, improving margins, head-count reduction, global workforce reduction, repositioning, aligning operations and resources worldwide, consolidating operations, downsizing, offboarded, offer of unpaid voluntary leaves, reduction in number of working days/hours.

Joan, a financial analyst with AJWright, should have spotted the red flags when she heard the above phrases creeping in her manager’s lingo.

The writing was on the wall.

After being handed the proverbial pink-slip, Joan started looking for a temporary part-time job which would pay the bills while she searched for a new job in her field.

It was then that she discovered the convenience and beauty of working from the comforts of her home.

For Joan it turned out to be a dream come true.

She offered accounting services – using her phone & internet to connect with clients – and then finally went on to open her own tax accounting business as a franchisee of H&R Block.

” It turned out all right for me, but it was a lot of hard work in the beginning”, says Joan. She offers a word of advice – Be careful of websites which promise you a quick buck.

What Work-At-Home Jobs Are All About

A word of caution: Work At Home job ads are full of scams. Do your homework. Be careful.

The median salary for most of these online work-from-home jobs is about $10/hour. For many of these jobs, the hourly-rate is not fixed. You are invited to bid on the jobs. And, since these online jobs are really location independent, you can find yourself competing with workers in India, China and other Asian countries who are willing to do the job at much lower rates.

For all these jobs, you typically need high speed internet access, some sort of VOIP connection (example – skype) and a basic familiarity with computers.

Some of these jobs may require you to undergo unpaid training and pay for your own equipment. For example a headset (approx $70) and a computer ($500).

20 Sites Which Offer Work From Home Opportunities

Some of the work-at-home job sites require a paid membership. However if you are willing to do your own research you can find the same jobs posted elsewhere on free job boards.

Though many of the jobs offered are “per hour”, on some websites like LiveOps, you get paid for the actual minutes spent on the phone. Read the fine prints.

Remember, the world of “work-at-home” job market is full of landmines with many online websites squirming to trap you into all kinds of scams. Always use your common sense. Check out Better Business Bureau guidelines for a sanity check.

Based on a true story sent by by Joan Jett, MI