Crisis | Job scams spike amid global pandemic

The global pandemic has caused businesses across the world to introduce new measures in order to protect the jobs of staff, as well as the future of an organisation.

However, due to the imposed lockdown that was put in place in the UK eight weeks ago, companies have been forced to cut back staff numbers as they have had to close their doors for business. The tourism and leisure industry has been among the hardest sectors hit by the coronavirus outbreak, with companies such as Airbnb choosing to lay off staff, while UK airline Flybe recently revealed it had gone into administration.

Due to these high number of job losses within such a short period of time, it seems scammers are pouncing on those most vulnerable and in need of work. In February 2020, FlexJobs revealed that almost 20% of jobseekers have been a victim of a job scam (up from 13% in 2016), with 22% of those seeking work knowing someone else who has been a victim of a scam.

According to Keith Rosser, Chair at SAFERjobs, the COVID-19 pandemic has fuelled a separate outbreak of job scammers, as he wrote on a recent LinkedIn post: “SAFERjobs, a UK Government-backed charity working with police and industry, are seeing an upsurge in fake healthcare jobs and roles.”