Chinese Au Pair Scam? Please help!

I have received several emails from an organization calling themselves KGE China, part of King's Glory LTD. I'm not sure if they are a scam or not. Please help?
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[email protected]

Apr 11 (2 days ago)

to me

Dear (my name),

Hope you are well. I hope you are still available for this exciting Au Pair China opportunity.

My name is Karen and I am one of the representatives of King's Glory Education (Au Pair KGE) - Au Pair Shanghai organisation. I have found your details on aupair.com and our agency register name is King's Glory Education.

Au Pair KGE is an agency specializing in Au Pair programs, working with the United States, Canada, UK, Germany and Australia, among many other countries. We were formed with the purpose of creating opportunities for young people to visit and learn about different countries in order to better understand the people, history and culture of each country as well as to improve their language proficiency.

Program Details: The China Au Pair program will place you with a Chinese family interested in giving their children not only a cultural education but direct experience of English. You will have the opportunity to look at family profiles prior to departure to help decide on your placement. There are four different time periods you can sign up for with this program; three, six, nine or twelve months.

Job Outline: You will be expected to spend less than 30 hours per week as an Au Pair with tasks like taking care of the children, taking them to school, and playing and teaching them, etc. In addition, most families will treat their Au Pair like a member of the family, so you might be invited on family holidays and gatherings!

Learning Chinese: As part of the Au Pair in China program, you will receive 4-6 hours of Chinese classes per week. Because of the small class size and great teacher, your Chinese should improve at a rapid rate!

Social Outings: There are a number of cities you may find yourself placed in, however, we design various social opportunities so that you have the opportunity to meet other Au Pairs. There are also organized trips to see local sites and explore the area.



Any au pair who is planning to stay in China for 3,6,9,12 months, most of their expenses will be covered by the Chinese host family as follow:


- Au Pair insurance
- Au Pair airfare (Allowance depends on services length)
- Chinese classes (4-6 hours per week)
- Accommodation
- Breakfast, Lunch and Dinner are also provided by the host family.

- Pocket money = Salary (RMB 1,500 per month / negotiable)

I have hereby attached our program details, application form, our company's approved WYSE Travel Confederation and IAPA certificates.

Should you be interested, please complete and send the form back to me. I will then search and organise a video conference between you and the potential host family to get a better understanding of each other before we finalise the process.

If you have any queries, please do not hesitate to contact me. Please visit http://www.kgechina.com or http://www.facebook.com/aupairkge for more details.

I look forward to hearing from you soon.

Kind regards,

Karen Leung
Regional Manager

King's Glory Education (Au Pair KGE) - Au Pair Shanghai / Beijing Representative Office

Room 911 Yuan Dong Building, 1101 Pudong Nan Road, Shanghai, China


Tel: (86) 18601688614

Fax: (86) 21 61683690

Email: [email protected]

Attached:
Application Form Au Pair 2013.doc Application Form Au Pair 2013.doc
99K View Download
Au Pair in China Reference.pdf Au Pair in China Reference.pdf
245K View Download
Aupair in China 2013-new pricing.pdf Aupair in China 2013-new pricing.pdf
395K View Download
IAPA & WYSETC certificate 2013.pdf IAPA & WYSETC certificate 2013.pdf
133K View Download
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[email protected]

Apr 12 (1 day ago)

to me

Hi (My name)

This is Karen again. Just wondering if you have received my last email and do you have interest in taking a position in China. Since there're some Chinese families currently looking for a native English au pair with passion and good personality who can help with English tutoring and take care of the children. Also it would be preferable that the au pair is able to start the position asap. However, the families are more than happy to compromise with your starting date, all the terms and conditions as long as you are the right fit. Therefore, if you are interested in this opportunity, could you please kindly let me know.

Please feel free to contact me if you have any queries.

Many Thanks

Karen
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[email protected]

3:50 AM (23 hours ago)

to me
Dear (My name)

Thank you for getting back to me and your interest in taking a position in China.

That's fine if you would not be able to start until June as the families are more than happy to compromise with your start day.

About the passpost number, that's fine if you provide us later, we just want to make sure the au pair has a valid passport when they apply the program. In fact, you have to provide your passport copy for our reference after you are accepted by the family successfully as we have to issue an invitation letter for you to apply the visa.
As of now, please send back your application form and we can then go further into the process. I have hereby attached the application form again.

Should you have any queries, please feel free to contact me.

Looking forward to hearing from you soon.

Kind Regards,
Karen
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[email protected]

11:41 PM (3 hours ago)

to me
Dear (My name)

Your application form is well received, thank you.

Before we go further into the process, I would like to make it clear again that the expenses will be covered by the Chinese host family as follow:

- Au Pair insurance
- Au Pair airfare (RMB 7,000 allowance for 12 months / RMB 6,000 for 9 months / RMB 5000 for 6 months)
- Free Mandarin Course
- Accommodation
- Breakfast, Lunch and Dinner are also provided by the host family.
- Pocket money = Salary (RMB1,500 per month / negotiable)

Just want to let you know that there's no extra cost or application fee that you have to pay for us. However, if you come to China, you have to pay for the flight ticket first and then we will pay back to you when your arrival. For example, if you stay for 9 months of being an au pair, you'll have RMB 6,000 flight allowances. After your arrival in China, we will pay back to you RMB 500 respectively in 1-8 months, and pay the rest of RMB 2000 in the last months. This is ensure that the au pair can complete the contract in a specific period and also reduce our risk that the au pair do not come to China. Since if we pay for the whole flight ticket, we may suffer all the loss due to the au pair not coming to China. I hope you can understand.

Surely, if you have the financial problem, we will try to help you in the flight ticket issue and let see how to slove the problem.

(My name), if you are okay with this, we can then start to find the family for you very soon.

By the way, this is our skype kgechina Please accept us in your contact list, thanks.

Should you have any queries, please feel free to contact me.

Have a nice weekend
Karen
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Please help??? This sounds like a great opportunity but I'm not sure. On their Facebook it says that they are a branch of one IAPA companies that is on the list. There isn't much information and I'm just not sure....

I work in a company called AuPair Shanghai in China and some of the information KGE China sent you is EXACTLY the same as our information. Usually they are okay, I was an au pair before with this company and I had no idea what I was expecting but it turned out to be okay anyway. I hope you make the right decision for you. It is hard to come all the way out here by yourself especially if you don't know 100% what you are expecting.

I received the exact same e-mail from the same person, Karen Leung. Her replies to you are also almost exactly the same as her replies to me, but not completely. She has answered my questions to the fullest so that's proof there's an actual person contacting me. She could just be copying and pasting. I don't know, it seems a little fishy though. But it seems legitimate too because of the interview videos on their website. I even went as far as finding the people they interviewed on facebook and I messaged them. I haven't received a reply yet, but they might not see it since it will go to their "other" folder. But what I'm wondering is, does Karen Leung actually work there? Is everything really paid for by the host family? I guess once we have that interview through Skype I'll find out if it's real. I just don't want to go to China and have no one there waiting for me. That's my biggest fear.

And it's also curious that they emailed me first. I didn't know about kge china until Karen Leung emailed me. Why the sudden outreach? They are partnered with IAPA and aupair.com, so they must have gotten my contact information from there since I'm registered there. But it's still curious that they sent me an application form and everything first without me contacting them first about it.

I may just be overlooking things and being too hopeful because I really want to do this. But who knows? Maybe it will be okay. I'll just see how it goes from here. I'll still get my passport (even if I don't go to China, there's a possibility I'll be going to Japan with my college in Summer '14 so I'll use the passport then). I'll just see how the Skype interview goes.