Recruitment Scam Notice

Recruitment scams are currently all the rage and even small agencies like ours have been targeted. If you’ve been contacted via WhatsApp, Text, Facebook or any other media, asking if you’re looking for work and you’ve never heard of us… you need to read this.

We have been made aware of people being contacted by someone claiming to work for Urbanberry Recruitment and asking if they can share details of a job vacancy with them.

The messages will largely be via text or whatsapp and will evolve in to ultimately asking you to register your details via a portal in order to be paid for work. You will never be able to speak to a person (because the number is computer generated) and they’ll offer you a “too good to be true” way of making money alongside poorly written messages.

PLEASE, PLEASE, DO NOT ENGAGE WITH THESE KIND OF MESSAGES! They are using the name Urbanberry Recruitment with the intention of securing your personal information and committing online crimes that are completely unrelated to our company and could end up costing YOU your identity.

We will NEVER ask a job seeker for money and we will never ask for personal information over text/whatsapp.

As scams across the world become more complex and convincing, it’s important to recognise the signs of a potential attempt to steal your personal information.

Here’s some red flags that you need to be aware of when it comes to recruitment scams:

• Unsolicited contact from a company you’ve never heard of with no explanation of how they got your details
• Offering jobs that can earn you lots of money from doing very little!
• No option to speak to a person
• Poorly worded messages that often don’t make sense
• Constant messaging if you fail to reply or creating an urgency around the job, ie “the job offer is only available today”
• Requests for money or to ask you to sign up to a website/portal and input your personal details/create a log in.
• Email addresses/websites that look the part at first glance but always double check domain names, the about us/contact us section carefully.

Remember that scammers prey on offering someone something they can’t possibly refuse. You need to prioritise your safety and security at all times and treat any suspicious messages with extreme cautiousness, checking out the validity of the company and the person before sharing ANY personal information.

You can also report all suspected scam messages by forwarding the text to 7726, or reporting it via the whatsapp reporting tool (as advised by the National Cyber Security Centre)

https://www.ncsc.gov.uk/collection/phishing-scams/report-scam-text-message

If you’re in any further doubt about a message you’ve received, please do contact Caroline or Emma using our [email protected] or [email protected] email addresses.