I’ve been looking for a job actively for over five months. Because of my location, besides the local newspaper, Craigslist is the most popular site for job listings. But I’m done with it. I am so tired of the job scams there. For those of you who aren’t familiar with this, there will be any number of jobs on CL (normally of the customer service variety) that are actually fronts for scams. When you apply, you normally get an email back quite quickly saying that they want to interview you. But first you must either go to some ‘company’ website to register or provide them with a credit report from some shady credit reporting website. It’s at the point where I can’t even bring myself to look at CL anymore. At first it was clear which ones were the scam. Asking for little to no experience yet paying at rates of $18+ an hour. But lately they’ve gotten more savvy. Expanding their job listings to more varied positions, making them more realistic looking. The last five jobs I’ve applied to from there has been these scams. It’s so disheartening to be so desperate for a job, and to see an email reply only to find it’s a scam. I don’t know why it’s gotten so bad because CL has been the source of my last few jobs. I’d really rather not stop using it, since my local paper rarely has any more than a handful of jobs but at this point I don’t need the added discouragement.
Yes, fer sure.
For jobs and dates alike, IMHO, CL is a total cesspool.
[rant]One detail that only, ahem, certain people might have noticed: When the idiot Attorneys Generals browbeat CL into getting rid of the “Adult Services” section, or whatever it was called, all the whores and bogus “massage” businesses just moved their ads to the “Therapeutic” section, which formerly contained mostly LEGIT massage professionals in private practice.
(I knew about that because I myself was just getting into the massage biz, having just gotten a CMT certificate, and I was using the Therapeutic section to get “practice clients” when I was in class, and to network with other local practitioners. When all the whores moved their ads there, it overwhelmed the legit ads by something like infinity-to-one, which remains the case to this day.)
[/rant]
I have been there and I feel your pain.
Also sucks: Advertising for a roommate on CL.
So does apartment hunting on CL.
Wait a sec, is there anything CL is actually good for?
Really, what is CraigsList good for? Even buying or selling stuff on CL (I’ve done both) is dicey and full of scams.
Funny, we furnished half our place via CL and didn’t have any significant problems. Maybe I just have a good BS detector.
CL is good for buying and selling goods. Insist on pictures where prudent, get a phone number, and be careful and you’ll do fine. I wouldn’t touch CL for services for the most part.
Actively looking for a sleazy, creepy sexual encounter? (Writers for Jezebel and Nerve need to find their inspiration somewhere!)
finding crazy people and potentially getting ripped off/robbed/burglarized. IMO Craigslist has become completely f’n worthless.
Do you detect a lot of BS on Craiglist?
CL started as a good concept, but it really has devolved into a cesspool. My mother-in-law suggested it as a job-search site, but the handful of jobs I was interested in at that point had requirements that were scammy or dangerous or both. I am not faxing or e-mailing a copy of my insurance license in response to an anonymous ad. I’m not paying $300 for a “marketing course” that I’m required to take and pass before I can be hired. And I’m not interested in selling a “new and innovative” insurance product that everyone needs but no one’s ever heard of. (I’ve since moved on from financial services, so these are a few years old.) These are ads that stuck with me as a reminder not to use Craigslist to find a job.
I detect a fair number of people who are pretty delusional about the value of the items they are trying to sell, so I just don’t respond to those ads. (I wouldn’t say that those people are the majority, though; I am probably pickier than most about home furnishings, but I’m sure there is a market out there for cheap but extremely dated furniture.) I really haven’t found it to be that difficult.
And the dating/NSA nookie ads? Those I read for the sheer amusement value. 
Just like with Freecycle, arrange to meet with the goods in a public place with people around, like a McDonalds and take someone with you, and a printout of the email details. Nobody from either freecycle nor craigs list has ever been to the farm and never will, we take anything to go somewhere else, and arrange to pick stuff up elsewhere.
That’s a little impractical if you’re talking about a large piece of furniture that requires professional movers and/or renting a truck.
I’m not going to defend 90% of what goes on on Craigslist, but it did work for me.
I had just about given up on Monster and Dice and I was kind of desperate so I thought I’d give it a try. I have an excellent position now which I got by posting my (anonymized) resume on Craigslist. Certainly I used a throwaway email address and I had to ignore the scam emails, but all it takes is one good response.
Granted, you probably have to have a background with some specialized skills in order to attract anything worthwhile, but it does work sometimes.
I’ve had fair results advertising for roommates on CL. It helps that I have very specific requirements - short term subletters only for my furnished second bedroom. I post pics and detailed terms and only reply to messages that make it clear that the prospect actually understands those terms. I’ve had to weed through a lot of dross, but by only even replying to the coherent and not clearly scam emails, I usually only need to meet 3 or 4 prospects to find a good one. The worst roommate I had last year was introduced to me by a colleague, he didn’t even come from CL! I’ve had 5 CL subletting roommates since 2009, and 2 were not great while 3 were. The not-great ones still paid their bills and didn’t wreck the place or make me feel unsafe, so I call it a win. Maybe if I was in a major metropolitan area it would be rougher?
Job searching does suck balls though. I saved a temp worker I was supervising from a tooth-whitening scam disguised as a dental office receptionist gig (she was looking for a permanent job on her break and we were chatting about it). She had her credit card out ready to “confirm” something for this “free sample” they were trying to get her to order before they’d set up the interview. Close call! I had only been half paying attention cause I wasn’t on break and had actual work to do, but “tooth-whitening” pegged it for me, since my college-age sister had gotten caught up in that shit like a year before. Luckily she was moving out of the country and just closed her bank account before she could get taken to she cleaners.
I agree. I have never had any problems with it, but I don’t use it as much as my SO, who also has only had good experiences with it. We just bought a pretty all-maple three-piece bedroom set for $175, and I couldn’t be happier. I was willing to spend over a thousand dollars on a nice set, but my SO insisted on going through Craigslist. Good thing I listened to her. Maybe we’re just lucky.
I’ve only used it a few times. I tried to sell a crap car and only got 1 (scam) response.
Since then though, we’ve bought thousands of dollars worth of kennel parts and had them delivered and we have spent less than $1000 for everything. We also used it to find the guy who supplies our firewood. He’s local, nice, helps stack, and has the best wood we’ve used so far. Oh, I also used it to find a guy who was supplying instructions for making a roof rake with only $30 worth of parts, when the area was suffering from such a shortage of the things that people were renting them out for $50 or more PER HOUR. Nice guy. He was mad at all the jerks trying to make a buck while other people’s roofs were collapsing.
When I’ve used Craigslist for job-hunting, it’s been pretty easy to spot the scam listings. There were still plenty of legit ones. Maybe it depends on your location.
Not that I have much experience with CL, but in this recession, I see a lot of strange behavior by jobsites like Monster.com.
Frequently, I will see a job listing…I might apply to it, but anyway it disappears. Then I will see the same listing (months later).
Which tells me that:
(A) the job really doesn’t exist-they keep the posting up because Monster allows it (for free)?
or
(B) the job posted was withdrawn, but Monster continues to post it.
Why would they do this?
To me, some possibilities are:
- Monster makes money from advertisers carried on its website (those colleges that you’ve never heard of are one). Hence, it gets paid per hit-so keeping obsolete/nonexistent listing up is a way to get hits.
- Monster allows clients to keep postings up for free-it generates activity, and allows Monster to write off some costs on its taxes.
I have seen the SAME job posted over 2 years on Monster-if I am incorrect-why would they do this?