What industry is dodgier than most people realize?

RedTie wrote: »

I'm sure certain chinese take-aways, certain restaurants etc must have some awful behind the scenes practices. I haven't ordered a chinese in years after the last one tasted like rubber covered in curry sauce.

I'd say Chinese's aren't all that bad, mainly because everything is frozen out of a packet. It's not quality food by any means but it's probably had every preservative thrown at it for shelf life, the same as you'd get in any fast food place.

English Language School business.

Often a cash business for both students paying and teachers being paid. Little protection for students or teachers.

Very little regulation or widely accepted accreditation, until recently, then a few of the dodgier places started going out of business.

Potential for customers to just buy visas into the country is a serious one. I personally know of a school that was offered a quarter of a million quid if they'd accept a certain number of 'students' and then mark them present every day, falsify test results and so on, even though the students wouldn't ever be coming to school.

The waste management business.

seanrambo87 wrote: »

Roads, ie resurfacing, maintenance and the traffic management game. Some fairly dodgy practices going on re the big companies. Money and workers rights etc.

I can believe it considering the state of some new works done recently. Lumps, holes and uneven surfaces in brand new tarmac. I wonder how much tax payer money they're given to half-ass it, head home, and leave it like that to annoy people for the next twenty years.

Online payment processors. Moneybookers, PayPal etc. They are essentially financial institutions that don't need to operate within the same restrictions that apply to banks. There was a thread on reddit detailing peoples horror stories with PayPal yesterday.

Zillah wrote: »

I can believe it considering the state of some new works done recently. Lumps, holes and uneven surfaces in brand new tarmac. I wonder how much tax payer money they're given to half-ass it, head home, and leave it like that to annoy people for the next twenty years.

As far as I can see, EVERYTHING that goes out to tender from the public sector is treated as a cash cow. I've worked on a couple of government contracts in the IT sector and it really opened my eyes to how our money gets spent.
Government agencies are clueless and get bilked for 2 to 3 times the amount they need to spend by 'consultants' who deliver needlessly complex, expensive barely functional solutions to do very basic things.
Never trust consultants in general. They're like ticks, they bury themselves in your skin, suck your blood and won't let go until they bleed you dry or you burn them off.

Employment agencies. Take a percentage of workers wages and all their rights.

Banking. Rotten to the core. Lies and embellishment left right and centre to get money from ya. Mortgage = death grip in Latin.

Ticket websites. Viagogo have agreement to get "allocations" from promoters like 20% of tickets to charge €500 for a €50 ticket promoter gets like 50% of this. Great doumentary on it called the great ticket scam on youtube.. The staff in Limerick treated like dirt and are encouraged to lie lie lie lie and lie some more. No doubt viagogo and stubhub will get plenty of tickets to any sold out show.

Chinese takeaways. Youd never eat their spare ribs again if you seen the meat before its "treated"!.