FAQ: The Reality of
Working at Home
By
Kimberly
Hargis
I
have spent the last five years trying to work at
home and have had some success. The following are
a few facts I have to share with people who are
either trying to or have given up trying to work
at home.
Q.
What about places that put up “pay money to get
a job” postings? Are they worth the money? Will
I get a job if I spend the money?
A.
If a job asks for money, then it is not really a
job. Think of it this way, would you pay to fill
out an application for a job outside the home? No,
of course you would not, so why you would pay
someone for a work-at-home job? Let’s say that a
listing says “Buy our software and you can work
at home.” This probably means that you buy the
software up-front and they give you a list of
places that might hire you. The
software is usually something similar to what you
already have in your computer, like a word
processor program or something you could buy in a
local office supplies store’s discount section.
The list of jobs they give you is usually a list
of companies they found in the phone book and you
can find the same companies yourself just by using
the Internet Yellow Pages. And if companies were
really hiring work-at-home people, then why would
they give the software to another company to sell?
They wouldn't! They would list the software
requirements in their help wanted classified
advertisement.
Fact
to remember: If they ask for money, then it is probably
not a real job.
Q.
What about these places that advertise “Pay to
join our group and we will help you find a job”
or “We have hundreds or thousands of jobs
listed” sites?
A. I spent over $500.00 on
those during my second year of job searching and
never did get a job. I’m not saying they are all
bad or tried to rip me off. Some were an
all-and-all-out scam. Others honestly tried to
provide a good job list for me to send my resume,
but if you don’t have the requisite skills, it
doesn’t matter how many honest job listings are
provided. Still others provided job listings that
were so old, they were no longer hiring or no
longer in business! These sites used old job
listings so they could say they had “thousands
of jobs” listed. There were also some that
listed jobs found listed by “monsters” and
headhunters. My best advice is if you want to join
one of these places, then you should go to a
“work at home”-type message board and ask for
other experiences with the company. Ask questions
like: Did you really get the material they
promised to send to you? What kind of jobs do the
sites offer? Did you find a job? Remember that the
people who run these companies often go to these
message boards and reply to the questions posted
by people like you , so be sure and wait till you
get several replies so you can get to the truth.
Fact
to remember: Do your homework before spending the money
– take the time to ask around and check out the
company with the BBB (Better Business Bureau) to
find out if there have been any complaints listed
against the company.
Q.
Are Medical Transcription (MT) jobs good jobs and
is this type of job for me?
A.
Just because you take the MT (Medical
Transcriptionist) classes doesn't mean that you
will get an at-home job. I took all the classes
and got certified. I then tested for jobs for a
year before giving up on that type of work at
home. This is not to say that it isn't a very good
job for some people, it just wasn’t ever going
to be the right job for me. I know several people
who do MT work at home and love it. Most MT jobs
require that you have at least six months’ to a
year’s experience at an in-house job before they
will consider you for independent, at-home
production. Once you have gained your in-house
experience
(or
you have been lucky enough to start out at home),
you have to be prepared to work eight hours or
more in a row transcribing.
Most
transcription jobs call for tight turn-around time
(TAT). A typical scenario is that they give you a
set time to record their audio using to your
transcription-recording machine (either via phone
line or web site). Then you have a set number of
hours to do the transcription and send it back to
the company. This means you have to have these
hours set aside five days a week to work, just
like you would if you when out to a job. Not all
MT work will be consistently supplied, so you
might find that you work fast and furious on
Monday and Thursday, and have no work on Tuesday,
Wednesday, and Friday.
My
best advice is if you are interested in becoming
an MT, then you should first check out the schools
with the BBB. Go to an MT message board and read
what other people who do this type of work have to
say and ask them questions you might have. Also,
buy training tapes to listen to before paying for
classes to see if you are the kind of person who
can listen to them all day and type what you hear
(given that an MT school will obviously teach you
the necessary vocabulary and formatting styles,
etc.).
Personally,
I found that I could barely understand half of
what the doctors. They talk very fast, some have
foreign accents, and/or there were high levels of
background noise (maybe the doctor was dictating
while driving). I wish I had done my homework
before I had paid for the at-home course that I
took. Now I have a $300.00 MT certificate and a
$250.00 transcription machine sitting in a box
somewhere in my garage.
Facts
to remember:
Be sure you really have the time the job requires
and the desire to do this type of work, check out
MT schools that interest you by asking about the
school on MT message boards to see who else has
gone to these schools, and check with the BBB to
see if there have been any complaints made about
the schools that were left unresolved.
Q.
I know HTML and made my own web site. Does this
mean I can be a Webmaster at home?
A. Probably not when it
comes to jobs found through Internet job searches.
Even if you know HTML, can make frames, tables,
can create your own graphics, and use copy and
paste JavaScript, you probably will not find a web
page design job just by doing a regular Internet
job search. I can write HTML freehand without an
editor and am competent at many other
web-page-related skills. I have sent out over
1,000 resumes and have not even gotten one honest
reply. Three years ago I finally realized that if
you really want to work at home doing web page
design, then you need to have at least a two-year
of college degree.
This
is not to say there are no honest HTML at-home
jobs for simple skills like routine updates to web
sites, but bear in mind that for every job
available for doing HTML out there, there are
thousands of people applying for it. I can't even
imagine the number of resumes that are sent daily
for jobs listed for HTML skills! My best advice is
either go to college and get a degree in CGI,
DHTML, Flash, ASP, VB Script, Java Script, Flash,
Database Interface, Oracle, and SQL server (to
name a few different skills and language codes) or
try to develop a clientele of small business
owners, local to your area, who need simple web
sites and can’t afford expensive
“professionals.” Many of small businesses
would love to have web site, but either have no
idea where to start, believe it costs too much
money, or that they have to sell their product
online (which they don't). They can use the web
page for advertising, promote sales, or offer
printable coupons. The best way to get this type
of work is ask your friends to tell any small
business owners they know about your services. In
your town has a local newspaper or newsletter,
consider placing an ad.
Fact
to remember: If you all know is HTML,
then either get a degree so that you can apply to
online jobs or hand out business cards to friends
and local small business to create a local
clientele.
Q.
I can make postcards, greeting cards, and write
verses using my home publishing programs. Can I
use these skills to get an at-home job?
A.
This can be done on a freelance basis at home.
There are books that offer lists of companies that
might buy your work. You can visit your local
library or book store to get Writer's Market
2003: 8000 Editors Who Buy What You Write
and/or Artists & Graphic Designer's Market
2003: Where & How to Sell Your Illustration,
Fine Art, Graphic Design & Cartoons.
Now
you are probably asking, “So what do you
do at home?” I make my money using affiliate
programs. Affiliate program are online stores that
pay you per click, lead, or sale by placing banner
and/or products on your web page. I, by no means,
make enough money to pay all the bills, but it is
a nice income to help pay the bills and to buy the
extras my family needs. To learn more about
affiliate programs by visiting http://momsbreak.com/webmasters.html
There
are jobs out there for at-home workers.
However, no one is actually going to find you a
job unless you have a marketable skill. You must
know what it is you can do, and then you
must find the market for it. If you are looking
for more ideas and suggestions about working at
home, please visit http://www.janktheproofer.com/ArticleIndex.htm
Good
Luck with your pursuit of a work-at-home job!
Written
by Kimberly Hargis
Owner of Mom's Break at http://www.momsbreak.com
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