You've got mail, it has a fake job offer

Tata Consultancy Services global head of human resources, Ajoyendra Mukherjee, says one of his biggest concerns these days is the fake job offers being sent out in the name of India's largest software exporter.

"A lot of these fake emails are going around. People who send these emails are technologically savvy.

"They have created email IDs in TCS' name. A number of these mails keep getting forwarded to me. It causes us a lot of problems.

"We have taken different steps and discussed this with National Association of Software and Services Companies as well," says Mukherjee.

TCS, on the careers page of its web site, has put an alert about fake job offers. It has also created a toll-free TCS Careers Serviceline (1800-209-3111) for people to report such job alerts.

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The company says on its website: "TCS does not send job offers from free internet email services like Gmail, Rediffmail, Yahoomail, Hotmail, and so on.

 "It does not authorise or appoint any agent, agency or company to conduct any employment interviews or charge any security amount, and will never ask you to deposit any money for or after getting a job offer."

TCS is one among many companies facing the problem of online job frauds. Other marquee names such as Wipro, HCL Technologies, Maruti Suzuki and Tata Motors, to name a few, are also on the list.

Naina Singh, a resident of Delhi, learnt this after coughing up Rs 100,000 to a recruitment agent.

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"I received a job offer from Maruti Suzuki. I had posted my resume on Monster.com and I took the offer to be real. I deposited Rs 100,000 in the account of one Aditya Kumar only to realise it was a trap," said Singh.

In emails from addresses such as marutisuzuki2011vacancy@rediffmail.com, aspirants are asked to deposit Rs 6,000 to Rs 10,000 in a bank account as a refundable deposit for sending air tickets for the interview.

The emails, promising job-seekers interview calls from these companies, carry seemingly authentic employee codes, holograms of the companies and designations of company employees who sent the letters.

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"Many people from Delhi, Mumbai and even as far as Chennai have fallen prey to such scamsters, who lure people with salaries ranging from Rs 30,000 to Rs 200,000 per month.

"Many times, the scamsters hack into the official email accounts of company officials, too, to send such emails," said the recruitment head of a staffing firm.

Typically, such emails read: "Your resume has been selected from Monster Jobs for our new job recruitment.

Tata Consultancy Services is involved for senior engineer, IT, administration, production, marketing, retail and general service departments, India. Our company is recruiting candidates for our new offices in Delhi, Bengaluru, Pune, Hyderabad, Kolkata, Chennai, Nagpur and Mumbai.

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"Your interview will be held at our corporate office in New Delhi on the 25th of October 2011 at 11.30 am.

"Your offer letter with air ticket will be sent to you via courier before the date of the interview. Our company can offer you a salary with benefits for this post of 65,000 to 200,000 per month + HRA + DA + conveyance and other company benefits.

"The designation and job location will be fixed by the company HRD at the time of the final process."

In one such email, aspirants are asked to deposit Rs 12,200 as an initial amount in favour of the company through any State Bank of India or ICICI Bank branch.

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Many companies have also issued an advisory in newspapers, urging people not to fall prey to such forged emails.
Vibhore Sharma, technology head, Naukri.com, says the problem is not as rampant as it was earlier.

"Last year, there were companies which would come back to complain of this.

"However, it has been a while since someone reported this.

"There are a couple of routes where this kind of trap could be set by people. One is their job posting on the site.

"When a candidate applies to a job posting, an email could be sent to take it forward. That is unfortunately out of our system and we cannot do much about it."

Sharma says his company, however, scans the job posting for any such words which might be in the vicinity of alluring or seeking money.

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"People who subscribe to our database of job seekers have access to information about the CV, which includes information on the job seeker.

"Dupes get offline and send emails from an alternative mechanism and this is off the system, so we cannot control it. We, however, constantly send messages to job seekers not to fall in such traps," adds Sharma.

Last week, the IT and ITES Industry Association of Andhra Pradesh cautioned the youth to be vigilant over fake job offers in these sectors.

The association said in view of the huge demand for employment in IT & ITES sectors, students and other job seekers were receiving fake emails and other communications.

"We advise those looking for jobs to verify the correctness of such communications through an authorised representative of the company," the association said.