Would you tell a lie to a total stranger for $300? How about $1,000? Okay, so remember this the next time some smooth talking yahoo is sending you emails or calling you on Skype telling you that he/she has “a great job for you teaching in China”. In fact they may offer you two jobs… Job A pays 6,000 yuan per month ($1,000) and Job B pays you 20,000 yuan a month “BUT only if you have a TEFL or TESOL certificate.” Both of these people are lying to you just to collect their fee for a job placement or a referral fee from a TEFL/TESOL training company, The following is 100% fact as you yourself can confirm with your own embassy, the Chinese consulate, SAFEA, or the China Foreign Teachers Union:
* YOU DO NOT NEED A TEFL NOR A TESOL CERTIFICATE TO TEACH IN CHINA
* YOU WILL NOT BE PAID MORE MONEY IN CHINA BECAUSE YOU HAVE A TEFL OR TESOL CERTIFICATE
* LESS THAN 5% OF ALL FOREIGN TEACHERS NOW WORKING IN CHINA HAVE A TEFL OR TESOL CERTIFICATE
* 80% OF ALL THE TEFL TESOL CERTIFICATES ARE NOT RECOGNIZED NOR ACCEPTED IN CHINA
* ROUGHLY 300 OF ALMOST 20,000 CHINA SCHOOLS & “LEARNING CENTERS” EVEN ASK IF YOU HAVE A TEFL OR TESOL CERTIFICATE.
Promises made but seldom delivered once a student pays his fees to the agents in China.
Scammers are not stupid – especially in China. To convince you that you need to buy a TEFL or TESOL training course (price ranges from $99 to $4,999 depending upon your own gullibility) they will spam hundred of bogus but appealing “teach in China” ads online every week with high salaries and great benefits, but will insert a sentence that says “TEFL Certificate Required” or “TESOL Certificate” required. After seeing dozens of these ads, people just start to believe the BS and assume that they have to get a TEFL or TESOL certificate to teach in China! One of these spammers was just caught at Yahoo Answers. See:
https://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20140826064935AAKBSKG
You further need to know that 95% of all China employment recruiters and job agents are not licensed nor registered to do business in China – even the foreigner who contacted you. They operate from their home of coffee shop, use free email accounts, and disposable cell phone number. They have no office and 70% have no web site. Most of them will not even give you their real or full legal names. In fact 20% of them are identity thieves that are only fishing for your resume and passport scans. Read this article for details:
If you do not know how to find your own job in China contact the CFTU for a firect employers list. If you are a bit lazy and like the convenience of using a recruiter, at least send them this form letter before and insist that they complete every question BEFORE you even send them your resume. If they refuse to cooperate or leave any space blank, they clearly have something to hide and are probably blacklisted at http://www.ChinaForeignTeachersUnion.org So if you do not use the below form and you later get screwed out of 30%-50% of your salary, or the police arrest you for $10,000 of unpaid credit card debts, don’t say you were not warned. When you work in China as an expat, you are surely swimming with sharks that have an insatiable appetite. We try to starve these predators, but too many newbie ESL teachers keep feeding them.
Don’t become a snack for the China sharks!
China Scam Patrol 
I want to make a comment/enquiry about AJS… or is it OKS ? This person, Nina (…or is it “Moon”?) with the email ajsjob@163.com didn’t send me the SAFEA and SAIC information I wanted and then acting as though I accepted, sent me an email asking 12,000rmb. What to make of this?