How can students identify and avoid scammers when securing writing services?

The writing industry is booming and full of legit and ethical professionals who provide quality services to diverse clientele. Nonetheless, we have a few "rotten potatoes" (for lack of a more definitive term) that are evidently blackmailing their innocent customers. In light of the heightening "blackmailers" in the writing business, I found it crucial to offer tips helping students identify the legit service providers and avoid the scammers.

1. From my experience, I find that conducting in-depth research on the service provider for insight on their background allows one to make a more informed decision. As an illustration, for freelancers, probably ask for credentials or social media profiles to check out their activity - more often than not, scammers are called out by other writers or clients they've previously worked with. Also, make a habit of scanning the threads in this forum before securing writing services to identify the "already busted scammers". To play it even safer, why don't you post the name of the writing site or freelancer you would like to work with here to get the opinions of trusted individuals?

2. Avoid sharing personal identifiers like your actual name, school email address, your affiliate institution. I find that most of my clients send assignment materials with all these details - while legit and ethical professionals will uphold your privacy and confidentiality, this offers scammers an opportunity to blackmail you. So, until you build trust with your preferred writer or site, why don't you edit out all details that could compromise your identity when seeking online services?

3. If the writer or site you are working with has fully met your course expectations, why don't you stick with it or the writer for long-term basis? As a student, if you have to work with a new writer or site every time you need writing help, this may automatically increase your chances of coming across a scammer.

What an odd post. You're a professional accessory to fraud! There's nothing even remotely ethical about it. Can you break down your idea of ethics to me? Please take off the rose-tinted glasses and respond as if you weren't about to throw a blanket down on the sidewalk and start selling me random items. Also, specific site and writer recommendations are against the rules of this forum, so you might want to stop calling for those. It's not going to happen.

Agreed. Even better to ask any new writer for his full name and location. A writer who deserves your trust should have no reservations providing his name and sufficient information for you to confirm independently that you're actually communicating with the person whose name he provided. I don't use social media; but anybody who knows my name only has to Google it + "HHS" to find some of my old US Federal Government reports still available online. That search will also satisfy any skeptics who don't believe that an experienced writer can provide excellent work in areas completely outside of his own degree areas. In my case, specifically, the government reports clearly bearing my name as "Writer/Editor" available on the public website of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services Inspector General are critical high-level audits of federally funded healthcare programs and entities. I never took a single course in any kind of auditing or accounting, and the closest thing to a course in healthcare policy was a single course in Medical Law that I took in law school. As long as I'm provided with the right source material, I can write extremely good projects in each and every subject area listed on my website, just as I was able to write government reports about healthcare agency program-policy compliance without any "degree" in healthcare policy or accounting or auditing.


That's also a good idea. The vast majority of my clients have shared their names with me; quite a few have also shared their academic institutions, and even the names of their courses and professors, because they're often included in some of their source materials in ways that would be very difficult to remove. Once you know that you can trust a writer, anonymity really shouldn't be a concern; but, of course, before you know that you're dealing with someone trustworthy, it's of paramount importance. One of the reasons that I choose to advertise here is that it provides assurance to new clients that my real identity is known to the administration of this forum, because it's required as part of the payment process. The one indispensable tool upon which blackmailers and all scammers, more generally, rely is anonymity. Once you know the real identity of the person you're trusting with your information (and your money), any chances of being ripped off fall pretty close to zero, especially in the case of anybody who's been doing business under the same ID and email address for decades.


Absolutely. One of the silliest comments I ever read on this forum was someone's advice never to use the same writer for more than a few projects. Your (rhetorical) point is spot on: the goal of any new customer in this business should be to identify a writer who deserves your trust ASAP and, ideally, without wasting your money on any bad writers and/or scammers, first. It's obviously nerve-wracking the first time you do business online with anybody whose work you haven't seen yet. So, once you receive great work from any writer, that should be an incredible relief, precisely because it probably means that you won't ever have to waste any more of your time finding another reliable source for your projects; nor will you ever have to lie awake at night worried about whether or not you're going to get ripped off. I've always told my clients that the main product I sell is peace of mind. My clients know that after I've scheduled their projects, they can (literally) forget about them until they're due from me. Obviously, they can't fully enjoy that peace of mind the first time we do business; but after our first project is behind us, they know that the one thing they'll never have to worry about or waste their time on is finding someone who can (probably) write anything and everything they'll need until they receive their degrees


Hi Caty. I didn't read Joan's comments the same way you did. I don't think she was necessarily suggesting that anybody should recommend a writer or company. I think Joan is suggesting that prospective clients should use this forum to research any writer or company under consideration, which might include asking for information about any kinds of problematic transactions. I read her comment as a suggestion designed more to identify writers and/or companies with reputations as scammers than as a suggestion to recommend specific writers or companies.

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It's hard for me to see what may be an innocent question as anything but a call for competing endorsements. Call me jaded. It seems here that the OP is going much further than recommending the search function. Some of their advice is fine; mainly, I'm looking forward to a response that defines Tutor Joan's personal definition of ethics.

Everyone who is registered as a freelance writer here competes directly for clients. The only difference is some people can pay for the premium promotional package while others can only afford the free membership and what that affords him in terms of free self promotion. Let the self promotion battle begin!

If I were you, noted, I wouldn't be so eager to start a competition. Still waiting for that answer from Tutor Joan...

@Freelancewriter I absolutely agree with you. And thank you for the further clarifications on the post.

@noted you are on point.

@Caty my 'ethics' entail providing quality services that the clients will be comfortable enough to hire me again and will not be worried about me blackmailing or scamming them days, months, or years on. From your post, it's either you are blatantly ignorant to what's happening in the industry or you just want to point out a reflection that has nothing to do with my post - this is to say you completely missed its meaning as intended.

What's exactly odd about my POV? Why does the forum call out scammers if it's not to avoid them? What is wrong with a student using the same forum to identify the professionals he/she can effectively work with in terms of trust and ensuring their privacy when seeking the services? Your "glasses" are far from being "rose-tinted" but completely opaque.

So you're an ethical relativist-- criminal behavior is not absolutely wrong, but rather, relative to extortion, being a professional accessory to fraud is ethical, so therefore, you are an "ethical professional." Seems shaky and arbitrary to me.

To be fair, I think Tutor Joan was merely contrasting companies and writers who provide their customers with exactly what they promise to provide and exactly what their customers are hoping to receive from them and companies and writers who rip off their customers, whether by delivering terrible and/or plagiarized work or no work, at all, and/or who misuse their customers' information to blackmail them. I don't think Tutor Joan was necessarily commenting on or disputing the fact that those services are prohibited by law in some places. Customers of honest writers aren't being victimized by the fact that those services might be prohibited, even when they completely satisfy their customers' highest hopes and expectations of each transaction.

It's precisely the same distinction as between a reliable honest weed dealer who provides the highest-quality weed, and as much of it as was bargained for vs. a dishonest weed dealer who provides a terrible product, or a bag of oregano, and/or much less weed than was bargained for. Granted, in some jurisdictions, both of them are equally in violation of laws prohibiting the sale of weed; but from their customers' perspective, they're just trying to find a reliable honest weed dealer who can be trusted, and they're trying to avoid getting ripped off by dishonest weed dealers who don't deliver a quality product. The fact that selling high-quality weed might be just as illegal as selling terrible and/or fake weed is a matter between the reliable dealer and the jurisdictional authorities; but that statutory illegality doesn't affect the customers of reliable honest weed dealers whose customers are thrilled with their product and who happily return to them over and over again for many years, and who never have to worry about getting ripped off by their dealers. Precisely the same is true of customers in this industry who simply hope to find one reliable honest writer for all of their writing needs.

Call. Always schedule a call with your academic writer. As an academic writer and dissertation editor, I always try to keep my clients for the long term, either to provide regular help for their assignments or to provide help for their entire dissertation journey.

If you need a writer or editor for your assignments, thesis, capstone, or dissertation, always make sure to give them a call and ascertain if they are the right fit for your needs.

I'm not confusing being an accessory to getting the munchies with being an accessory to academic fraud. It's "precisely" a strawman.

Essay companies and writers who advertise and write essays for people studying at universities in England are breaking the law. No ifs or buts or exceptions. Doesn't matter how many caveats the writer adds about not handing in the work as your own. It is illegal. Students need to heed this warning before hiring anyone who is acting illegally.

@a1writer The problme is that no matter how we both explain things over and over again, the students do not seem to care that they are breaking the law. That is mainly where the problem lies. If the students do not care, why should the writer? That is what I am finding difficulty in explaining to these people. Got any idea how we can make both sides care that they are actually breaking international laws in this case?

@noted
The essay writer is the one committing a criminal offence, not the student. In the UK, some universities are making students aware of the repercussions of essay cheating in their induction process. They point students to assistance available from the university, if students are stuggling with their essays.

Universities are also scrutinising students' Personal Statements to see if their grammar and style is similar to that used in their essays. Of course this presupposes that the students wrote their own Personal Statement in the first place! Universities and students' unions are collaborating to develop other methods of detecting essay cheating, but they are not making their techniques public for obvious reasons.

'Commissioning a third party to do a piece of assessment for you, with the intention of submitting it as if it were your own work' is treated by University College London (UCL) as 'contract cheating'. This is a specific type of academic misconduct which can be investigated and penalised as a breach of UCL's assessment regulations, the outcome of which may be expulsion.

Professional bodies, like those for engineering, laws, architecture etc., take a stern view of cheating and can disbar you from practising your chosen profession. Many professions, e.g., medicine, teaching etc., are also subject to 'fitness to practise' procedures designed to determine if you have the knowledge, skills and character required for that career. If you haven't done the groundwork now, you are setting yourself up for failure down the road'.

The English law makes the act of advertising essay writing services as well as actually writing them, illegal. Any caveats given to students about not handing in the work as their own, does not make the service legal.

Most essay companies and essay writers are aware of the ban on essay writing in England, and any who continue to provide the service are dishonest and unscrupulous, putting students' careers at risk.

@Freelancewriter, your statement was right on point and sums it all.

@a1writer, the definition of 'legal and illegal' should be instilled in the clients seeking the assistance - as writers, we offer the service because it's in demand. Otherwise, were it not so, no one would be in the 'illegal business' as you would term it. When writing service providers create websites, the organic traffic is driven by the visitors who need whatever is on the product portfolio; meaning they are willing to pay for it. Point being, you are attempting to 'educate' the wrong crowd with a two-faced approach that is clearly a cry for attention. One minute you are preaching 'it's illegal in the UK', a second prior you were referring dissertation services from a reputable blah blah blah!

@Tutor_Joan
If you bothered looking at UK Essays website for example, you will see that they do comply with English law by undertaking various checks on prospective clients and rejecting those they believe would cause the company to breach English law.

If you had read my post thoroughly, you would see that English universities are taking steps to educate students about the illegality of so-called 'essay mills' and offering them assistance via the university itself and students' union. The serious repercussions for students caught 'cheating' are hammered home.

If you were honest and reputable you would not provide a dissertation service that you know to be in breach of English law. Unless of course you only believe in obeying laws that suit you. The onus is on you to obey the law.

I don't see this as being two-faced or attention seeking. I do however detect a whiff of someone who is annoyed that I have spelt out a law, which does not suit their purposes.