Labor Secretary Silvestre Bello III on Tuesday warned the public against bogus job offers overseas following reports received by the Philippine Overseas Labor Office that a fraudulent scheme lures workers to work in Yukon territory in Canada.
To show a semblance of legitimacy, the report said the scammer uses the name of a website of a legitimate Yukon HR practitioner to dupe unsuspecting Filipinos. Victims were then asked to pay the amount of USD440.00 in exchange for non-existent jobs.
The fraudsters took advantage of the Department’s announcement in September last year on the employment opportunities in various industries in Yukon.
Bello advised the public to validate the authenticity of any job offers with the POEA through its website (poea.gov.ph).
He also urged jobseekers to report to POEA any suspicious activities encountered to info@poea.gov.ph.
The labor chief clarified that a bilateral labor agreement has yet to be signed by the Philippines and Yukon, making the reported job offers spurious.
“Based on the report by our POLO Vancouver, the Yukon government is still studying the memorandum of understanding, and DOLE will provide an update on this undertaking,” Bello said.
Sometime in August last year, Bello and Minister Ranj Pillai signed a Joint Communique to establish cooperation in the area of recruitment of Filipino workers to Yukon.
After the signing, a proposed MOU was forwarded to Yukon, which aims to establish a system for the recruitment process in the deployment of Filipinos to the said territory through a Nominee Program under a government to government arrangement.
“This government to government agreement shall validate the existence of guaranteed employment offers. Hence, we are warning the public to be very cautious of this scam that seemingly capitalizes on the still-to-be finalized labor agreement between the Philippines and Yukon,” Bello said.
