I recently posted about my experiences with AskSunday, a virtual assistant service. While AskSunday wasn’t a good fit for me, it is a legitimate company and I know people that are using it and that seem to be happy with it. However it turns out that a scammer is using the name of the legitimate company as well as variations of it (Ask-Sunday, MakeSunday, AskSunday LLC) in order to defraud job seekers. The scam was reported by a number of people in the comments of my original post (thanks!!) and was still ongoing as of December 15th.
The scammer who uses a variety of names including “Brian Clark”, “Brian Moore” and “Thomas Moore” basically promises employment for AskSunday LLC and as part of it tries to get complete bank account information from applicants. It them seems like he then he transfers money into the account, ask the applicant to spend it on a project and then withdraws it. The result is the applicant being out of pocket.
More details below. I also highly recommend reading the many great comments below the original post. Please post any new comments there.
The scam seems to start with an email sent to people posting on job boards (e.g. monster). A sample email is posted below:
Having studied your resume/profile at Monster.COM we believe you obtain all skills required for a part time position available in our company. Let me briefly restate the main points that the following position does entail at Make Sunday LLC (licensed, bonded and insured lifestyle management agency specializing in the management of personal & business affairs and concierge services for VIPs, celebrities, athletes, entertainers and corporate executives). We provide customers with access to a team of personal assistants accessible by email, phone, and the web to handle both small daily tasks and handle complicated assignments. Feel free to study our corporate website http://www.MakeSunday.com for a better understanding of what this job is about.
P.A. Requirements
-Age 21-60 years (male/female)
-Very sharp and a quick learner. A go-getter and non quitter
-Ability to anticipate needs of client.
-Possess fluent knowledge of the city and geography of surrounding areas. Knowledge of the restaurants, amenities, clubs and tourism industries to provide to our guests.This position is available national wide (90% home-based). Make Sunday is looking for talented, career-oriented assistants. You will be a key player in every stage of the process-from collecting information and making pre-arrangements to assisting with personal requests during customers stay.
The responsibilities of the position include
-Organizing and research (when no clients visiting your area)
-Planning (Events, Entertainment, Meetings, Social events)
-Make all pre-arrangements for our customers and provide assistance with any request during stay
-Errand Running
-Shopping and Acquisitions
-Household needs and family needsBenefits
– $31,200.00 Annual Salary ($600.00 every week) + Bonuses
-Automatic pay increases at six-month intervals
-Five-day workweek, no Sundays required
-Medical, dental, disability, and life insurance with dependent option after 60 days
-Employee Purchase Plan
-401(k) with company matchThis position is available immediately. Apply now for more details by replying to this email.
Sincerely, Brian Moore, Jr
HR manager
MakeSunday.com – A Personal Assistant Dedicated to You.CONFIDENTIALITY NOTICE: If you are not the intended recipient, you are hereby notified that any dissemination, disclosure, distribution or copying of this communication is strictly prohibited. If you have received this communication in error, please promptly notify the sender by reply email and destroy the original message. This email transmission (and/or the attachments accompanying it) may contain legally privileged and confidential information, and is intended only for the use of the individual or entity named above.
IMPORTANT: 1) It’s recommended to login into your email account and add info@MakeSunday.com to verified sender’s list. This is necessary to prevent delivering our messages into spam/bulk folder.
2) Make Sunday LLC will never share any of your private information to any 3rd parties.’
Some of the scam used the domain MakeSunday.com. The domain is now down, but Google Cache has a copy and it is a copy & paste from an old version of the legitimate AskSunday home page. A whois query for MakeSunday.com lists:
Domain name: MAKESUNDAY.COM Name Server: ns3.nic.ru Name Server: ns4.nic.ru Name Server: ns8.nic.ru Creation Date: 2009.11.10 Expiration Date: 2010.11.10 Status: NOT DELEGATED Registrant ID: WBIG6BZ-RU Registrant Name: Atashnaa Werner Registrant Organization: Atashnaa Werner Registrant Street1: 158 Pinon Way Registrant City: Nederland Registrant State: CO Registrant Postal Code: 80466 Registrant Country: US Administrative, Technical Contact Contact ID: WBIG6BZ-RU Contact Name: Atashnaa Werner Contact Organization: Atashnaa Werner Contact Street1: 158 Pinon Way Contact City: Nederland Contact State: CO Contact Postal Code: 80466 Contact Country: US Contact Phone: +1 4033432220 Contact E-mail: michele.hiatt.hr@gmail.com
A Hungarian email address, russian DNS servers and an address that is that of an empty house for sale in Colorado (RE/MAX real-estate listing here). The scammer is not exactly trying to be subtle. The registration for Ask-Sunday.com has a similar set of fake entries.
Interestingly enough, the fake sites kept the phone and fax numbers of the real AskSunday company. People who called AskSunday mention that AskSunday seems to be aware of the scam and is warning people about it.
If you have anything else to add, please add to the comments below the original post.