Staying Safe

That box sits on top of six pages here. It is printed in full on this one because this is the page you might send to a friend.

Now the honest bit. Most people who open a page like this are fine. They have a buyer acting odd, or an offer that smells wrong, and they want to know if they are being stupid. Usually they are not. So that part comes first, and the heavy part waits until the end.

The rule the rest of it hangs on

Somebody at home knows where you are going and when you are due back.

Say it out loud before you leave. Not a text once you are already there.

That sounds small. It is the step that makes every other step work. If nobody knows where you went, nobody can come and get you.

Grown ups who work alone in other people's houses are told to do the same thing. Their version is a check in and a check out, and it is run by an employer. You do not have an employer. So the person you check in with is a parent.

Work at somebody's house

An adult goes with you into somebody else's house. Not a friend, and not a lift there and back.

That is all of it, and there is no clever version.

Charleston, South Carolina puts it in one line: do not invite strangers into your home, and do not go to theirs. They wrote that for adults selling a used phone.

Loads of real jobs happen at a house. Walking a dog. Clearing a yard. Fixing a bike in a garage. You can do all of those. You just do not do them on your own.

Money is where this goes wrong most

Almost none of this page is about being hurt. Most of it is about being cheated.

The payment apps say so in their own words. Zelle tells people not to use it with strangers, and adds that it "does not offer purchase protection". No purchase protection means no dispute button and nobody to appeal to. It was built for moving money between people who already trust each other. That is exactly why a stranger wants you on it.

Three rules cover nearly all of the rest.

Money never goes out from you to a buyer. Not a refund, not a delivery fee, not the extra when they claim they paid too much. A wrong payment gets fixed by the person who sent it.

Money never passes through you for somebody else. No cut is worth it. You have no idea where it came from, and the name on that account belongs to an adult you live with.

Everything stays inside the app. The fees are what buys you a record and someone to complain to. A buyer who needs you outside the app needs it for a reason.

There is a longer page on the tricks aimed at new sellers, and it is worth ten minutes before your first sale rather than after it.

What a listing gives away

A photo of the thing you are selling can also be a photo of where you live.

Your address is the one thing to guard. Not the street sign, not the number on the door, not the school badge on a jacket in the background. Look at the picture before it goes up.

Keep the talking in the app too. Somebody who wants your phone number to sort out payment wants you in a place with no record in it.

Nobody publishes a good count of how often any of this happens to people your age. I looked, and it is not out there. So this is not a scare number. It is a cheap habit that costs you nothing.

When a customer makes you uncomfortable

You are allowed to leave. You do not owe anyone a reason and you do not have to be nice about it.

It is worth spelling out, because that is the bit people freeze on. Almost nobody freezes over the money. They freeze over seeming rude.

Lines that work, out loud, right now:

• "My mum is outside waiting, I have to go."
• "I will message you about the rest of it."
• "I am not doing that one. Sorry."

Then go. The money can be sorted out later from your own kitchen.

Tell an adult the same day. Not because you did something wrong. Because a second time is much easier to stop when somebody already knows about the first.

If the job feels wrong before it starts

Turn it down. A job you have not taken yet is the cheapest thing on earth to say no to.

The warning signs are boring and they repeat. They want you on your own. They want it right now. They would rather your parents did not know. Any one of those three and the answer is no.

You will lose the odd job that was actually fine. That is a good trade and it is not close.

The last part of this page is not about business

Some of what people your age go through has nothing to do with selling anything.

If you are somewhere very dark tonight, the people listed below are awake, they are free, and they have heard it before. You do not have to be in danger to talk to them.