Canadian Jobs and the crafty scammers preying on Foreign Job Seekers

Raj Singh *

Quite frequently, we read about human smugglers and fraud employment agents duping gullible people from the north-east India. What appears in the newspapers is just the tip of an iceberg. Based on the number of helps sought from this author which never went public, it is believed that many more cases remain unreported. Foreign job seekers need to be careful about fraudulent attractive foreign job offers.

Canada has plenty of jobs. And the salaries, the working conditions, the society and the environment are excellent. Canada is a happy country!

These factors attract millions of people from around the world to a rat race for the country. Many fulfill their dreams, but in the modern gold rush, many others perish at the hands of smart scammers preying on their ignorance. The victims suffer not only shattered hopes but their punctured wallets.

Job vacancies at any point of time range between 300000 and 450000. Salaries are five to ten times that paid in a country like India. Every year, Canada receives about 300000 immigrants, 200000 temporary foreign workers and about 100000 foreign students to make up the labor shortage for her gigantic economic engine rolling.

Can anybody go and grab a job?

No. The competition is global. Only the smart people win; smart in preparing themselves and smart in finding ways through fair means.

India is one of the top source countries of immigrants and skilled workers for Canada. She sends 35000 emigrants and 13000 students to Canada every year. In the same way, many Indians reach other developed countries too. Today, Indian diaspora is 26 million big and their remittance back home is 73 Billion US Dollars every year, the biggest in the world.

This bright scenario has a hidden ugly side – the pestilence of fraud immigration agents and human smugglers foraging hundreds of thousands of unprepared aspirants longing for the nice opportunities abroad.

THE VICTIMS

There are a few types of people who fall victims;
1. The innocent-ignorant
2. The dishonest-ignorant

The innocent-ignorant people simply stumble on job ads or unsolicited emails and trust the fraud agents to arrange jobs for them quicker than other agents but through procedures that they do not understand. The fraud agents take advantage of their desperateness and ignorance.

The dishonest-ignorant deceive themselves by allowing the fraud agents to work for them even when they suspect that the method is not right. They want to reach Canada "somehow".

TIPS FOR THE INNOCENT-IGNORANT

All the victims from Nagaland and Manipur, India, who approached this author for helps when they ran into difficulties with their fraud agents fell in this category (they lost money in the range 35000 – 600000 INR). I believe, majority of the foreign job seekers belong to this group. The following tips will help them escape the baits of the fraud agents.

1. Do not entertain any unsolicited email promising you quick work permit or visa.

2. Be warned if the response to your enquiry is too enthusiastic with promises too good – quick visa, good salary and perks etc.

3. Always ask for a copy of the original job advertisement of the company offering the job, company website, contact person and phone number.

4. Google the company name with the word "scam" and examine the search result.

5. Genuine E-mails should be from the company domain and not from free web mails like Yahoo, Gmail or Hotmail etc.

6. Never accept job offer that comes without an interview, phone or skype. Never trust that job will be offered based on your nice resume. Fraud agents often trick people by sending Application Form and Interview Form to be filled and serve them with job offer after a few days. This never happens in Canada.

7. Neither hiring company nor recruiter will ever ask for any money from candidates before actual travel to Canada. You might feel it is unfair on your part not to spend money for such a lucrative offer. Do away with that feeling. Leave the agent the moment he starts asking for any money big or small. They often ask the money as administration fee, visa fee, LMIA fee, travel ticket etc. Under Canadian labor law and immigration law, employers are supposed to bear all these expenses and not the foreign workers. The agent/recruiter should get the money from the employer not from you. Applicants bear the fees in cases of immigration and study permit applications NOT IN THE CASE OF EMPLOYMENT.

8. Pressure is a sign of fraudulent dealings. Do not yield to it.

9. Never believe the agent's claim that he has connections in Canadian Embassy/consular offices.

10. Read a lot about the Temporary Foreign Employment rules and the LMIA rules available on the internet. LMIA and work permit take a long procedure taking 3 to 5 months with a lot of your involvement. Crafty scammers forge these documents almost perfectly and too quickly without asking for anything from you except money. You must reject it.

TIPS FOR THE DISHONEST-IGNORANT

You are too desperate. You want to reach Canada somehow – right or wrong. That's too risky. You are endangering your life by doing so. You need to be careful about the following facts:

1. It is very likely that the fraud agent will leave you with some forged documents for a hefty amount of money. You will be caught by the stringent Canadian fraud control measures at any of the travel check points in any route.

2. If you outsmarted them, you can still be caught anytime during your stay in Canada as various procedures after your entry deploy extensive intelligence and electronic reference databases.

3. Catching you for fraud means banning you from entering Canada for the next five years or removal from Canada if it happens inside Canada. Your misrepresentation remains permanently in Canadian database affecting your life.

4. Your Permanent Resident or Citizenship status can be revoked at any stage when caught even after settling in Canada for years.

5. This can kill all other prospects of going to other developed countries as Canada and many other developed countries share intelligence data on immigration.

So, what you are doing is for a better life and not for ruining it. The risk of ruining your life is too high when you take help from fraud agents.

ADVICE:

In this internet world, you have all channels open to you for exposing yourself to potential employers or genuine recruiters. Find potential employers, genuine recruiters, established job boards and connect yourself with them with your carefully prepared resume for employment. Canadian government has clear labor policy to protect Canadian job seekers and hence, sometimes it is hard to get Canadian employment offers by applying from outside Canada.

Genuine Immigration consultants can design a plan for you to reach Canada legally so that your employability gets enhanced and, become an internal candidate for all opportunities in Canada. STAY AWAY FROM FRAUD AGENTS.