How to tell whether a job advert is real

One test settles most cases. If anyone asks you for money to get a job, do not pay. Being asked to pay for any part of recruitment is a major warning sign.

It makes no difference what the fee is called: a registration fee, an admin fee, a background-check fee, a uniform deposit, or a "refundable" R250 paid at a PEP till so somebody can verify you. The Employment Services Act generally bars charging job seekers a fee, and the Department of Employment and Labour has told job seekers in plain words not to pay.

One more rule is worth knowing. A private employment agency may not keep your original ID document or your original qualification certificates (section 14(d)). If somebody holds your originals in a drawer until you come back with money, treat it as a scam and report it.

Many scams are cleverer than a straight request for cash, though. Most of what follows are warning signs: reasons to stop and check, not proof on their own. Some are strong evidence, such as a request for money, or for your banking details before there is a written offer. Proof usually comes from the employer itself, when it confirms that the vacancy or the message is not theirs, as several did in the cases below.

Six signs of a trustworthy advert

These are signs of trust, not requirements. A genuine advert can leave some of them out: a confidential agency advert does not name the client, and not every employer uses reference numbers or closing dates. But faking all six takes work, and many scams run in volume, so an advert missing most of them deserves a harder look.

• A named employer or a named agency.
• A named town, not "nationwide".
• A specific job title with duties under it, not "general workers needed, no experience, R6 000".
• A closing date.
• A reference number, or at least some way to refer to the advert.
• An application route you can trace back to the employer.

The last one matters most. A genuine advert leads to a channel you can check for yourself: the employer's own careers page, a government circular, a registered agency, or a third-party application system that the employer's own website links to. A fake advert usually has to send you somewhere the employer's site does not point to, because the scammer does not control the employer's website.

The advert that borrows a real company's name

This is the usual shape now. The employer is real, well known and entirely innocent. The advert is not theirs.

In March 2025 Africa Check looked at Facebook posts claiming Shoprite's Usave was hiring people with no education, aged 18 to 55, at R4 000 to R6 000 a month. The posts pushed applicants to unverified Google Sites links and WhatsApp numbers, and one of the links was flagged as potential malware. Shoprite's position was that it will never ask for your banking details or passwords, and that its vacancies are on its own careers site.

In February 2026 the South African Police Service warned that a WhatsApp message circulating in its name, supposedly from a captain in Jeffreys Bay, was false. The SAPS said all available vacancies are advertised through proper and credible media platforms, including the SAPS website, and told people to check at their nearest station. Police opened an inquiry.

In January 2026 Africa Check examined a message spreading on Facebook and WhatsApp that claimed Sasol was taking 50 000 young people into a learnership programme, with a stipend of up to R15 000 a month. The application link went to sasol-learnerships.apply-here.xyz rather than to sasol.com, and the advert had no programme name, no entry requirements, no reference number and no closing date. Sasol says it does not use WhatsApp for recruitment communication, that genuine learnerships appear on its own careers page with criteria and deadlines, and that nobody should click unknown links or hand over personal information.

And in July 2023 SAnews reported on people recruited for positions at Medupi Power Station, invited to interviews in Gauteng, then pressed to pay upfront for accommodation, transport, PPE and medical assessments. Three suspects appeared in the Randburg Magistrates' Court. Eskom's position was that its vacancies are on its own recruitment website and that it will never ask an applicant for payment.

That is four sectors and one pattern: a real name, and a request for money or documents that arrives through a channel the employer does not control.

The fee scam that used the Department's own name

In February 2024 the Department of Employment and Labour warned that its own name was being used. The scheme promised administrative jobs and asked for a R250 "refundable" fee, payable at PEP, supposedly for background checks. The Department restated the law, that no person may charge a job seeker a fee for employment services, and said its own services are free. In its own words: "As soon as you're asked to pay anything towards recruitment and related employment services know that this is likely to be a scam."

If the Department of Employment and Labour can be impersonated, so can we. A familiar name on a message proves nothing.

A process that looks real, run by someone you cannot check

The version that catches careful people looks like a proper process. There is a phone screen and a friendly WhatsApp conversation. Then somebody asks for documents "for the background check": an ID copy, a bank confirmation letter, proof of address, sometimes a payslip.

A real employer may ask for any of those at some point, so the list is not the tell. Who is asking is, and when. Be careful if someone wants your identity documents unusually early. Find out who is asking, why they need them and what they will do with them. A real agency or employer can usually offer its own application form, an email address on its own domain, or a meeting in person, and can tell you why it needs each document. Before you send anything, check the person and the organisation behind them:

• Is the vacancy on the employer's own careers page, or on a channel you found yourself?
• Does the email come from the company's own domain rather than a free-mail address?
• Does the phone number match the one on the company's own website? Is there a landline, and does the switchboard know the person?
• Can the agency give you its registered name, its registration number and its physical address?

You are allowed to be blunt about this. Candidates do ask recruiters to prove who they are, and a legitimate recruiter can. If you are unsure, ask who will receive the documents and how you can confirm that.

Banking details are a separate case. A request for them before there is an offer in writing is a strong red flag, because an employer has no reason to pay you before it has hired you.

Until you have confirmed who is asking, send nothing: no money, no documents and no bank details.

Overseas offers that are trafficking

This is the most serious one, and it is current. In a warning reported by TimesLive on 31 July 2026, the Department of Social Development cautioned young South Africans about fake overseas job offers, advertised mainly on social media, that have led people across the Thailand and Myanmar border into scam compounds. Its trafficking in persons manager, Buti Kulwane, said a growing number of young South Africans had been trafficked to scam compounds in Myanmar after accepting what looked like legitimate job offers in Thailand, and were then forced into cyber-enabled financial crime. The departmental spokesperson, Sandy Godlwana, said victims reported being promised good salaries, free travel and overseas employment, then subjected to long working hours, intimidation, violence and debt bondage. Many are coerced into recruiting friends and family, which is how the networks grow.

That last point changes how the offer may reach you. It can come from someone you know and trust, who is already trapped.

Before you accept any work outside South Africa, insist on a written offer with the employer's registered name and address, check that company independently, and tell your family exactly where you are going and who is taking you.

Keep two things apart here. A legitimate overseas employer or recruiter can arrange and pay for your travel, and that alone is not a warning sign. The warning signs are these: anyone who wants to hold your passport or keeps your documents, who controls where you go, where you stay and who you speak to, who pressures or threatens you, who tells you that you now owe money for the travel or the placement, or who asks for payments nobody can explain. An employer you cannot verify is one too. Those are the markers of trafficking and debt bondage, and they are the reason to walk away however good the salary sounds.

How to find the employer's real channel

Do not use the link, the number or the email address in the message. The scammer controls everything in it.

Search for the company yourself. Open its own site and find its careers page. Look for that vacancy, with that reference number and that closing date. For a government post, the vacancies are in the weekly Public Service Vacancy Circular published by the Department of Public Service and Administration, free, at dpsa.gov.za. For a state-owned company, start from the recruitment page on its own domain. If that page sends you to a third-party application system, that is the route to use, and a link from anywhere else needs checking against it.

If the vacancy is not there, phone the company's switchboard on a number you found yourself and ask.

How agency adverts work, and what to check

Agency adverts are easy to copy, and one kind in particular looks suspicious when it is not. A confidential advert leaves out the client's name for a legitimate reason: the client does not want its competitors, or its own staff, to know it is hiring. With no employer named, that advert looks a lot like a fake one. The difference is that a real one leads back to an agency you can check: a registered name, a registration number, a phone number you found yourself, and a consultant who can tell you about the role.

Adverts also sometimes stay up after a role has been filled, so "the advert is still live" tells you little about whether the job is still open. In our experience both of these happen at legitimate agencies, though practices vary from one agency to the next.

There are registration rules for private employment agencies. The Department of Employment and Labour publishes lists of registered agencies, but when we checked in September 2026 the lists on its site were dated 31 January 2020, and we have found no live public lookup. So we cannot honestly tell you to check a register online. If you are unsure about an agency, ask for its registration details, then check the agency with the Department or at your nearest Labour Centre.

The WhatsApp job groups deserve a fairer word than they usually get. Many are run by volunteers, and in some the admins vet what gets posted. Karen Lloyd, who runs several of them around Johannesburg, told The Citizen on 12 February 2025 that an advert asking for an upfront admin fee is an immediate red flag, and that the groups pass scam notices between themselves. That is the same test as the law's, in plainer words. The channel is not the problem. The fee is.

Where to report it

Report the crime to the SAPS, at a station or anonymously through Crime Stop on 08600 10111. Keep the messages, the number, the link and any proof of payment.

If a private employment agency charged you, report it to the Department of Employment and Labour at your nearest Labour Centre.

If your personal information was collected under false pretences, lodge a complaint with the Information Regulator. Complaints go through its eServices portal at eservices.inforegulator.org.za, with general enquiries on 010 023 5200 or the toll-free line 0800 017 160.

If you paid, tell your bank immediately and open a case. If you sent your ID number and documents to someone you could not check, treat it as an identity exposure: tell your bank, consider a Protective Registration with the Southern African Fraud Prevention Service (contact centre 011 867 2234), and watch for accounts opened in your name.

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