During 5 years, 8,000 rides and 1,000 meals deliveries, rideshare driver Lenny Sanchez says he misplaced monitor of the variety of instances scammers tried to steal his earnings.
Con artists claiming to be from Uber or Lyft ceaselessly pinged his cellphone, providing particular bonuses or VIP jobs.
Their aim: to entry his account login and reroute his pay to their financial institution accounts.
Sanchez says he by no means fell for the scams, however he is aware of many drivers who do.
“If you’re a gig worker in Chicago for longer than a month, you’ve definitely run into a scam artist,” says Sanchez, who left full-time rideshare driving in March 2020 and is now director of the Independent Drivers Guild of Illinois.
In one other rip-off, real-life passengers will faux their cellphone died and ask the driver to make use of theirs. Then they entry the driver’s rideshare account and swap the banking data to their very own — “robbing them of their earnings from the back seat,” Sanchez says.
Steve Bernas, president and CEO of the Better Business Bureau of Chicago and Northern Illinois, says he’s seen an uptick in all types of scams concentrating on gig workers reported to the BBB Scam Tracker since folks misplaced full-time jobs in the pandemic or started working from dwelling.
Workers who supply rides, ship groceries, pet-sit or carry out different duties on apps are being targeted by outdated scams repurposed for the gig economic system, together with:
- Fake web sites that mimic actual gig work platforms;
- Emails or texts from scammers who faux to be hiring freelancers;
- Fake communications that seem like from an actual gig work app, claiming to want the employee’s login and password or their private or banking data;
- Fraudulent postings on social media providing high-paying orders on grocery procuring journeys — if the gig employee pays an upfront charge.
Any request for an upfront charge is an apparent purple flag, Bernas says, as is a suggestion of excessive pay for low-skilled work.
“It all comes down to being too good to be true,” he says. “People are not stupid. I think they’re just desperate.”
Steve Bernas, president and CEO of the Better Business Bureau of Chicago and Northern Illinois.
Some of the scams prey on folks in search of work, then contain them in one other rip-off.
That’s apparently what occurred to Ronae Ellis of Harvey, who has a company job in high quality assurance however sought exterior gig work final spring to assist pay her property tax invoice.
After taking a look at job postings on a wide range of web sites, Ellis says she received a textual content from a girl who claimed she was with a widely known cost processing firm. She employed Ellis for a job printing and mailing checks. The pay was $3,000 a month, and the firm would reimburse Ellis for a laptop computer, printer, verify paper and ink.
“I thought this would be perfect,” Ellis says. “This would get me back on track.”
Ellis labored for about three weeks, however then the girl who’d employed her began making excuses about paying Ellis. First, the girl mentioned she was having bother sending it by means of Zelle. Then it was an issue with Cash App.
And then the girl’s cellphone quantity went useless.
Ellis misplaced about $800 in provides and now realizes her “work” might have been a part of a verify rip-off. She reported her expertise on the BBB Scam Tracker to warn others.
“Normally, I’m not naïve,” Ellis says. “It was a learning experience.”
Uber and Lyft have both cautioned drivers to be alert for phishing scams that come by e-mail, textual content or cellphone calls.
Instacart and DoorDash say they, too, educate gig workers about tips on how to spot phishing scams and shield their accounts.
Grubhub says when a driver’s banking data is modified, the app routinely notifies the driver and locations a 72-hour maintain on withdrawal of funds.
“These instances are rare on the Grubhub platform, but we nonetheless communicate proactively with all of our partners about the importance of protecting their personal information and keeping their accounts secure,” a spokeswoman mentioned.
Lenny Sanchez of the Independent Drivers Guild of Illinois, which is one among a number of teams internet hosting a gig workers occasion on Sunday.
Anthony Vazquez/Sun-Times
As for Sanchez, he says rip-off artists are only one extra frustration for folks attempting to earn a dwelling one journey or supply at a time.
Rideshare drivers have a number of different issues, he says, from being lured in by carjackers to extra mundane points like rest room entry.
The drivers’ guild and a number of different gig employee teams are holding a Chicago GigFest from 11 a.m. to five p.m. on Sunday at Grove 10 of Schiller Woods Forest Preserve to share data and press for higher working situations.
“It is brutal,” Sanchez says of the scams. “These guys are really creative.”
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