After an amateur dramatic production, a well-spoken spectator chats friendly with you and says you, or your kid who was in the school play, have all the talents necessary to become an actor.

Alternatively, you are approached when you’ve taken your kids out for a day and told that one of them is perfect for TV commercials. This pleasant, well-spoken guy offers to represent you or he says that he knows a talent agency that would be very interested in you or in this child, whom they’ll make the next Brad Pitt.

Now this looks like a dream come true for you and when are invited to the office of the agency, you are really impressed: everything looks so professional. As you sign up, you are asked to pay a registration fee. Well, you don’t become a start for nothing, so you happily pay up.

A date is then fixed for a photo session, because, clearly, they need some really good photos for marketing purposes. This makes sense, so back you go and pay a good price for the photo session.

After that, you are constantly called back for must-have acting classes or for “How to rock an audition” workshops – and you will have to pay for them, hundreds of dollars! You keep hoping that you or your kid are about to be discovered, and you are getting some work – on unpaid gigs, which are, of course necessary to “to build up your portfolio”.

The scammers play with your hopes, telling you how you (or your child) have such unique potential. Some companies even organize “fake” auditions to qualify for their representation, so once you are “selected” you feel even more confident that you could really become a star and pay your registration fee right away.

How to avoid: ask a lot more questions and research the name of the company first - before you register - and see what complaints there are against them. Ask around and see if you can find anyone else “represented” by them. There are plenty of reputable agencies out there – if you really think you have talent, approach them.