(NEXSTAR) – What’s not to love about a part-time, well-paid job “assisting TEMU merchants with product reviews”? A lot, it turns out, according to people who posted their experiences online.
The job offer comes in the form of an unsolicited text message from a self-described recruiter, sometimes named “Monica” or “Juliana.”
The work consists of as little as 15 minutes per day, and promises free training followed by pay as high as $200-$3,000 per day, in one example.
For those hoping to bank hundreds of dollars (or even thousands!) on their lunch break, however, those who responded say the offer is not what it seems.
One Reddit user described being directed to a training site by a “coach” named Hannah:
A couple minutes later, I was instructed to log out and log back in to the “training account” with the username and password “Hannah225.” Upon login, I was taken to the same site, which now had an “account balance” of $1,936.00. I was directed to a subpage under a link labeled “start booking.”
The link took me to a page featuring what resembled a single product listing: product photo, product title, product price, and “commissions.” The type of thing you’d see on Temu’s site. None of this text was clickable, but at the bottom of the screen there were two clickable elements: a 5-star rating scale indicating a 4-star product rating, and a submit button. I was instructed to “adjust the rating from 4-star to a 5-star submission,” then click submit.
That Redditor ultimately refused to go any further, but others described what happened after they started the job.
One Reddit user, also contacted by “Juliana,” wrote that during three days of work what appeared to be a lucrative side hustle turned into a financial nightmare.
After initially making money, the Redditor described getting assigned “combo orders” that resulted in wages being subtracted. After the balance went negative, the poster said the only way to continue working was to offset the negative balance with funds from their own bank account, which the training coach, “Sofia,” encouraged.
The Redditor said that between the additional funds and help from Sofia to finish a task, they were able to build the work balance back up to nearly 18,000. Trying to withdraw the money, however, apparently resulted in an “error” and a frozen account that could only be unfrozen with an additional $9,000 deposit.
“Please do not get involved in this!” the Reddit user wrote. “It’s embarrassing for me to even admit that I was so stupid to think this was a legitimate company. I was just trying to make some extra money to help pay the bills and maybe even make a little more to put towards retirement. Instead I lost all that money!”
The scam is so widespread that Temu itself is warning the public. Temu asks customers to beware of “spam messages, emails and phone calls” often used to steal personal and financial information. Temu also requests that people report any of the following instances:
- You were approached by an unknown third party claiming to be a courier, asking for extra shipping charges.
- You were approached by a merchant claiming to be from Temu asking you to make transactions via other channels outside of Temu (QR code, e-wallet, wire transfer, etc).
- You were tricked into purchasing items and into initiating payments/transactions for a fake website/app similar to Temu with a notification that you had won something.
- You received any messages from an unknown number offering financial service or a part-time job, and were asked to fill in personal information (e.g. your Temu account information or transaction number).
- You received a call from an unknown number asking you to disclose/verify your personal information or offering you a refund you did not request.
- You receive false job advertisements impersonating Temu. They usually offer low threshold and high income to attract you to enter your personal information.
- An official calling himself Temu finds you and offers to start business cooperation with you.
The Federal Trade Commission also warns against replying to random job offer texts, and reminds that you should always remember that “you didn’t apply for a job with that company.”
No matter how promising the offer sounds, the text is likely designed to convince you to click on a link or share personal or financial information.
The post Got a ‘Temu’ job offer via text? Why people who replied are warning others appeared first on WHNT.
