My Work-At-Home-Jobs....

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I think this is the 3rd time I'm re-posting this entry. This was my very first entry on this blog titled: My Life as a WAHM. But due to a popular public demand [yep, it's a 'popular demand' as 2 people asked me to blog about it...LOL], here it is again.

I believe the question regarding my WAHJs is the second most asked question [first being: Why don't you DRIVE yet?] to me. Questions range from: How did you land your jobs? What's the/your secret in landing a WAHJ? Can you give me tips? Can you help me get a WAHJ?

Unfortunately, I don't have the answers to the last 2 questions. I really don't have any secrets or tips. I just applied and applied until I got accepted...which answers the first question. As for the last question, I really wish I can help BUT since telecommuting is very competitive, the chances of having vacancies is next to nothing. If and when one of the companies I work for has opening, I will definitely post it here...and that's a promise.

All of the work-at-home-jobs I have [or had] are location based...meaning, they all require that one needs to be a US resident to get accepted. Most of them require a degree [tutoring, scoring, lesson developer required I had some teaching experience for obvious reasons I guess].

Having said that, I believe that what I found in the work-at-home industry is just the tip of the iceberg. I know there are a lot more out there that I have not found yet. Even if I have multiple jobs, I am still actively looking for other WAHJs. I guess that would my secret then: Perseverance! Just remember, looking for a Work-at-Home-Job is no different than looking for a job outside the house...

Here is the list of what I do/did. Read on...

Online Tutoring

I am a teacher by profession so the first thing I looked for when I was searching for an online job is something related to teaching. I have not set foot in a classroom setting for the last 6 yrs, well, so yeah, since I got here. But technically, it’s only been 4 yrs since I have stopped teaching. The reason? My first work at home job was online teaching, tutoring, if you may. Yep, I did that for almost 2 yrs. It’s very challenging and frustrating at the same time because you don’t see your students face-to-face and you don’t know if they’re making faces while you’re trying to teach them something. I enjoyed it for as long as it lasted but I don’t see myself doing it again. I had some pretty nice students but I also had my share of not so pleasant experiences. After 2 school years of doing it, I decided to stop and concentrate on my other job – coding.

Coding/Data Entry

In the work at home community, this job is probably one of the most sought after. It’s basically data entry. And in my quest to find a legitimate data entry job, I was actually scammed once – just once…and I think that should be enough for anybody…LOL. I fell for those “processing orders pay a one-time fee of $14.95 for training materials” scam. Once I got the so-called "training materials", I knew right away that it’s a scam. I filed a complaint to PayPal right away so I got my money back…woo hoo!!

I landed my first coding/data entry job in April of 2003. One coding company did a massive hiring spree back then and I was one of the not-so-experienced that got lucky and got on board...and that was my spring board. I am now working for 3 different coding companies. I really like this job because you can do it just about anytime...if the work is there. The only downside of doing this job is it’s very sporadic, work wise. Since the 3 companies I work for cater to the same kinds of clients, when there is no work in one company, the other 2 would probably have no work as well. Right now, it’s S-L-O-W that’s why I thought of starting a blog…who knows, this maybe my next ‘raket’…LOL!! I've been reading some of my fellow pinays' blogs [a big time lurker here]and from what I've been reading, they're actually making money doing it.

Consultant/Lesson Developer

This is probably by far my favorite gig. It’s basically doing online lessons for a University that offers online Tagalog/Filipino classes. You read it right, Tagalog classes. Ain’t that sweet??? It’s only a short stint, 3 -5 months per project, but it pays really well and I get to polish my Tagalog and is getting paid for doing it. Cool huh??!! Right now I’m waiting for a call to see if we’re doing it this year. I hope we will…fingers crossed. If only it’s available year-round, I’d quit my other jobs.

Online Scoring

This is one of the first jobs I applied for but did not get it right away. The name of the job pretty much tells what I do…I score online. What do I score? Students’ responses to open - ended questions. It’s only seasonal since these tests are taken by students as some kind of assessment tests. It’s a good thing because it is a boring job…LOL. It’s hard to pass up because it is easy enough and it pays better than some of the jobs we find outside the house. So when it’s available I try to score until I feel my eyes closing from boredom... or until I ran out of items to score...whichever comes first or happens first.

Call Center

Technically, I didn’t do this job but this is the first place I applied for. I did and passed the modules for this job. I got activated but didn’t have the nerve to actually start taking calls. I never did. I was so worried that I may not understand what the caller is ordering or that the caller may not understand me being a Filipino and having some kind of an accent. After thinking about it for a couple of months, I decided to let them know that I’m not doing the job. Big sigh of relief after that…hehe..

That's it. Goodluck to all of you who are looking for a work at home jobs.