The Philippine Overseas Employment Administration (POEA) warned Filipino jobseekers of scams targeting applicants for employment aboard cruise ships.
In an advisory, POEA explained that scammers would send an e-mail to jobseekers claiming to represent a major company such as Carnival Cruise Line, Royal Caribbean Cruise Line, Disney Cruise Line, and MSC Cruises, P&O Cruises, among others.
The scammer will ask the jobseeker to send money as processing fee for his/her employment and once the jobseeker has remitted the money, the scammer will no longer contact the victim.
Jobseekers are reminded that those seeking for job opportunities in cruise ships should never pay any fee, including recruitment and placement fees, as legitimate manning agencies and cruise lines are not allowed to charge administrative fees from seafarers.
How to spot cruise ship scams
– POEA listed several red flags that jobseekers need to observe.
– Jobs are advertised on free websites and social media. Scammers would not pay advertisement for jobs that do not exist
– Emails are sent from free email accounts such as Yahoo and Gmail.
– The correspondence is in poor English and very informal
– Scammers operate from countries such as Malaysia, Ghana, Nigeria, etc.
– The job offers are usually very generous (high salaries, short working hours, long paid holidays, etc.)
– No thorough interviews with candidates
– The job offer is for free, but asks payment for visa, training, or lawyer fee
– Payment is through MoneyGram or Western Union
