the fake job
September 7th, 2007
turned into a real article for the Washington CityPaper
and just to answer any lingering questions of truthfulness:
the article is 100% true
I wish I were creative enough to make this stuff up
but I’m not - I’m just feckless enough to stumble into it in real life
if anyone has questions for me about the article, about Columbia’s lax admissions policies, about fiction v. nonfiction, about my brother, about the internet and my facility with same, about my novel,
about profitable Nigerian investment schemes,
or about Kuala Lumpur (an excellent city!),
please feel free to email me (aringreenwood at hotmail dot com) - I can be feckless, as I say, but I’m also pretty nice
Mike Smith said:
Hi Arin,
My name is Mike, and I, too, was duped by a company that hired me over a craigslist posting.
Over the course of a month (May 17th through June 18th) I worked as an onsite field technician, doing warranty repair work for a company that supposedly subcontracted to a subcontractor of Dell computer. I completed over 80 calls at such places as Northrop Grumman, SAIC, and Booze Allen Hamilton, troubleshooting and repairing their personal computers. What I didn’t know, however, was that this subcontractor was all a sham, with a phony office address, phony business number, and everything. After I eventually quit, and researched more about the “company”, I found out the person who hired me was actually working out of his home, a home which was later foreclosed upon (I saw it listed on a foreclosure web site), and numerous other lies he told me began to surface. The worst part was when I was contacted by another former employee, who was in the exact same situation as I was. We were constantly stonewalled about our pay, they’d tell us “two more weeks”, or “after you fill out these forms”, stuff like that. and eventually they just stopped returning our calls and e-mails.
To date I am owed more than $2,000, and my fellow employee (no telling how many more of my fellows are out there, since we were all so de-centralized) is owed more than $6,000.
I have a stack of paperwork, including dozens of pages of official Dell paperwork, verifying that did the work, and am in the process of filing an “unpaid wage claim” with the Virginia Department of Labor and Industry. Apparently this person who I worked for is a well-known scammer to their office.
I was a recent college graduate when I took this position, hoping to make some quick money to pay off school bills. Instead, I’m now facing bankruptcy, and have thousands of dollars worth of credit card debt.
The worst thing is, Dell doesn’t even care about our situation, nor does DecisionOne, the subcontractor who my company received it’s work through (DecisionOne gets the work from Dell, and we in-turn got it from them). Dell didn’t even respond to my attempts to contact them, and DecisionOne said “We paid your company, it’s up to your company to pay you”, without any regard to the fact that one of their subs was ripping off its employees.
And I don’t even know how many other people were treated this way.
Anyhow, I just finished reading your article, and I’d really like someone to talk to about this situation. Is there anyone you can recommend? And thank you, so much, for making other people aware of rip-off artists like these.
rsk said:
you honestly gave your SSN to complete strangers from craigslist, and didn’t bat an eye when they said that they were buying the WSJ for less than 1% of its value?
you deserved to be used, and you would have deserved anything worse that happened. really, this story is about as embarrassing for columbia as george bush is to yale.
Brian said:
Great article!
j said:
Arin,
please keep writing, you make the story come to life, I could see in my mind every person that you described, I could live every moment. Thank you for writing, please don’t stop.
Jeff said:
What is also amazing to me is that you acknowledged you didn’t make the best decision, put yourself out there, and some people still feel compelled to put you down for it on the internet — even though it doesn’t impact them one bit.
Mike said:
Just wanted to say that I liked your article in the City Paper.
Egor said:
Hey Arin!
Really liked your story. Do you (or WCP) mind if I’ll translate it into Russian and post in my blog with your name and/or link to your website?
Regards, Egor.
David said:
This was a great article, Arin. I found it in the Washington City Paper and googled your name. Hope you ditch the lawyering and stick with writing!
Charles said:
Great article Arin. I think RSK’s comment is just plain mean. Anybody can be scammed, even RSK. I have written an article about scam relief on my website at http://www.taxsolo.com/legalissues.htm - feel free to check it out. Good luck, getting some justice out of this bozo.
coocoo for cocoa puffs said:
I am so mad at this guy. I feel like I was sh*t on by this bastard too. Please publish the results of this saga…
Judy said:
If Mike Smith or anyone else who has been scammed by Scott Strother reads this I would appreciate it if they would email me at tiggersdontjump at gmail dot com. My son was, until very recently, one of Scott’s employees too. He was paid for several months (always late) but is owed quite a bit of money.
I’m interested in organizing to share information so we can file with the various labor departments in the states where Scott had people working.
kilili said:
Only a great writer can make an enjoyable reading of such an unfortunate situation. Arin Greenwood did not deserve to go through this scam.
I will buy you falafel (is this some Chamorro dish?) when I am in DC. I hope you no longer need the air mattress.
Where is the novel?
Jay Levitt said:
I belatedly ran across your article in the City Paper… great story, sorry you got scammed.
But: After ALL that, I can’t believe what I read in the docket…
Fool! Self! Lawyer!
And that goes double for recent graduates! Have you not learned?
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