IAPWE is a scam – avoid the “International Association Of Professional Writers And Editors”

IAPWE is the “International Association of Professional Writers and Editors”

Or at least that’s what it calls itself. Sorta like a trade, umm, trade union.

They advertise themselves around the internet as having some interesting work on offer. Like this for example:

IAPWE

Our organization is seeking content writers to create articles and blog posts on a variety of topics.

The rate of pay is $20 per 100 words (this comes out to approximately $100 per article or $50 per hour).

Some topics you may be asked to write about include the following (you can always turn down a topic if you do not feel comfortable writing about it, however if you have experience or expertise in a specific area, please let us know):

By the usual level of these things that’s a damn good pay rate. Actually, it’s close enough to newspaper pay rates for scribbling drivel on the internet. It’s an excellent pay rate.

So, you apply and a week later (a nice touch, don’t seem too eager) an email comes back:

Thank you for submitting your application. Upon further review, we have determined that your sample meets our quality standards and are pleased to inform you that your application has been accepted.

We will ask you to also accept an invitation to our freelancer portal where we will assign writing and editing tasks.

All payments are made through Freelancer, which is a widely-used freelancing platform that is free to join. This will also help you gain experience and positive feedback on your freelancer profile, which will help you in getting hired by other clients on the platform as well.

You may also be interested in our membership. We offer several different membership options, including a free option, that provides lots of helpful resources for our writers and editors. Please keep in mind that we have open enrollment for new members intermittently throughout the year. This opening will be available until the end of this week. We have not had many openings as of late so we do not know when we will be accepting new members again.

To get started, please go to https://iapwe.org/register

There’s a time limit to this offer of gainful employment, is there? So, you go to the sign up page:

Basic (FREE)
Includes access to our Resource area, which contains a collection of tools and resources for writers and editors

Oh, so you get to see their “resources” if you sign up. That’s nice.

Professional $19.99/month $4.99/month
Includes everything that comes with the Supporter level
Plus access to our Jobs Board, which contains writing and editing jobs from across over 100 different websites including jobs not posted anywhere else online (updated every week)
Information and updates on problem clients that try to scam freelancers, protecting our members from getting scammed

Oh. You’ve got to pay $60 (but it’s a $240 per year value!) a year to be able to even read the job ads, let alone gain access to that well paid work?

And that access to resources about how not to get scammed as a freelance is a nice touch.

For, of course, the entire thing is a scam to gain those sign up fees.

Just so you know.