Most of the students try to arrange for a scholarship to fund their studies. Due to the huge amounts of students competing to win scholarships, scholarship scams are coming into picture by and large.
Legitimate scholarships are being imitated by these fraudulent programs to extract money from people applying for funds with them. Legitimate scholarships include the ones sponsored by government agencies, charitable foundations and other corporations. These online scholarship scams make money at your cost without providing you anything in return. Therefore, scholarship seekers should be more alert while choosing such a program for themselves.
Awareness on Common Online Scams
Avoiding the scams by being alert can be the key here. Online scholarship scams generally try to request money during the application process in the form of fees of different kinds. They might ask you for the payments towards the fulfillment of application, entrance, reading, judging or administration. The charges may also include processing fee to get information related to the offer.
Apart from these, the scams may additionally charge you with hidden fees after the submission of application. They may also notify you about the scholarship they are awarding, through e-mails that require a redemption fee before collecting. Legitimate scholarship programs do not ask for any initial payments while awarding the scholarships so the receiver should immediately get alerted and take necessary steps to avoid the scam.
Also, scholarships do not levy tax. They are tax-free and any scholarship requiring a tax payment by you would surely mean that you are being trapped. However, if the scholarship money is used for any purpose other than paying for tuition, it might be counted for tax deduction. Other purposes might include the use of scholarship money for personal use like the purchase of a computer or for travelling. Such reasons may invite tax deductions but they should be paid directly to IRS. The tax in the form of federal, state or sales tax should never be paid to the organization awarding the scholarship.
Legitimate scholarships do not require any financial information of the individual like bank account or credit card number. The scholarship seeker should never disclose such details to any organization claiming the awarding of scholarships.
Measures to Avoid Scholarship Scams
Legitimate scholarships are free of charge, excepting a few and the seekers should be vigilant in searching and choosing the program most suited for them. If the scholarship invites the payment of hidden fees, you may as well choose to opt out of it and select another program that offers the same free of cost.
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