Working from Home
It is not uncommon for individuals living with MS, at some point in time, to consider working from home due to fatigue, mobility issues or other MS symptoms. While working at home is a growing and legitimate employment opportunity, you still need to use caution and steer clear of any site that asks you to invest money, provide access to a bank account or give up a great deal of personal information up front. These are indicators of a possible scam.
The following resources are designed to help you explore work from home options and if working from home is right for you.
Currently Working and Want to Work from Home?
If you are currently working and looking for information on how you may be able to work from home or "telecommute" the following article, How to convince your boss to let you work from home, from "Work at Home Now" by Christine Durst and Michael Haaren, might prove helpful to you in making a case with your employer for telecommuting.
Working from home can be considered a reasonable accommodation if you need to do so to better manage certain MS symptoms. If you are requesting to work from home as a reasonable accommodation, check out the accommodations section of our website for additional information and assistance.
Also, the following telecommuter assessment will give you a basic idea if telecommuting is right for you.
Not Working and Looking for a Home Based Job?
If you are thinking about working from home, learn everything you can about what you’ll need to be successful. Working from home is a real job that requires discipline: you have to set your hours and stick to them. To be sure you have what it takes, check out the following Work at Home Readiness Assessment . This assessment, from the book "Work From Home Now" by Christine Durst and Michael Haaren, was developed to help you identify certain traits and characteristics that could have an impact-positive or negative-on your success as a home -based worker. Your score, will reveal your self-perceived profile and help you determine if you possess the traits that help home-based workers stay on track and succeed. You may also, want to check out the West at Home website which describes what a typical day might be like for someone working at home.
In addition to exploring your readiness to work from home the tools below will help you test some basic skills required for most work from home positions.
Additional Tools
Services and Resources
My Employment Options provides free job placement and employment services for beneficiaries of SSI and SSDI between the ages of 18 and 63. For individuals currently receiving SSI/SSDI benefits who want to work at home, My Employment Options has over 500 full-and part-time work-at-home jobs available with reputable national companies. They also offer many on-site jobs in cities throughout the country.
Teleworktools:This website provides up-to-date information on Telework, such as who does it, how they do it and what skills and equipment are needed. It also provides links to legitimate local and national Telework resources available to assist people with or without disabilities.
Workaholics4hire has a FREE database to connect you with all types of legitimate work from home jobs.
Rat Race Rebellion features hundreds of screened employers of home-based workers, and thousands of screened jobs and projects. Staff researchers sift through 4,500 plus work-at-home job leads weekly to find the legitimate positions posted to the site.
Worldwideworkathome.com offers information and resources relating to work at home jobs, telecommuting, freelance work, home business ideas, and more.
2Work At Home. Com has a list of companies that offer telecommute positions or who are open to flexible work arrangements.
Call Center Jobs
There are over 80 companies that hire for call center positions. Below is a sample list of those companies. A more detailed list can be found at Rat Race Rebellion
Alpine Access is a call center company that uses customer service representatives that work from home. Employees use their own telephones and computers. The company provides representatives for clients like Office Depot and J. Crew.
Convergys hires home-based call center agents who provide support in customer service, and also supplies sales agents or help desk staff for companies.
West at Home also hires home-based customer service agents. They cater to a specific range of industries, specializing in health care and pharmaceutical support, as well as the hospitality industry.
LiveOps provides customer service support for roadside assistance, insurance and a variety of major corporations. Bilingual skills a plus.
VIP Desk provides call center support and also offers a home-based concierge service to clients.
Billing Services Group:Voicelog provides representatives to perform verifications for transactions done online or by telephone. Many states require changes to telephone service and other remote transactions to be verified by a third party, which VoiceLog provides. Great need for foreign languages.
Employees need to meet some basic requirements, including having a telephone and access to a PC. Although the work is conducted from home, interviews for the job aren't always done remotely.
Virtual Assistants
The International Virtual Assistants Association (IVAA) is a non-profit organization dedicated to the professional education and development of members of the Virtual Assistance profession, and to educating the public on the role and function of the Virtual Assistant. The IVAA provides continuing education, networking opportunities, member benefits and optional certification to its members, as well as provide a member directory and Request for Proposal (RFP) system for parties interested in utilizing the services of member virtual assistants.
Internet Girl Friday provides information technology support as well as administrative services for clients nationwide.
Non-phone jobs
Google Jobs Google hires, ad quality raters. They pay aproximately $13.00 an hour. You can work your own schedule. It helps if you have a foreign language in addition to being proficient in English. Highlight in your resume that you love to search the Internet and how comfortable you are with the Internet. This is a very hot job and it’s difficult to get in. You may need to send your resume more than once.
Flexjobs provides legitimate, professional jobs that offer some kind of job flexibility. They have professional job leads in over 50 different job categories, from entry-level to executive positions, and ranging from freelance to employee jobs. All of the jobs you'll find on this site include telecommuting, a part-time or flexible schedule, or a freelance contract
Working Solutions hires agents for customer sales and service, tech support, as well as data entry and editing projects. Sales and service projects include enrollments, retail sales, hospitality reservations, and dedicated account support. They also provide technical assistance on electronics, website usage, software and telephony.
Click N Work has a variety of opportunities as work is varied so they need people from a wide range of backgrounds and skills. Types of professionals often needed include analysts/consultants, information professionals/specialists, writers/editors, web searchers, data entry specialists,
telephone interviewers, photographers and translators.
Search engine evaluators
The following are companies that hire individuals to evaluate and improve search engine results for some of the world's top internet search engine companies.
Internet Researchers
The Bureau of Labor Statistics reports that the job outlook for online researchers is above average through at least 2018. All you need to get started is some research know-how and a high speed Internet connection. It also helps if you have a specialized skill or degree, because companies may be looking for your particular area of expertise. To learn more read about Working from Home as an Internet Researcher