What's with these people?

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I think there will always be people out there who will always take advantage of others...

Quite some time back, I was lamenting and expressing disgust with people who use others, especially charities, for their own interests. And just some time back, received an email forwarded by my boss notifying me about an attempt by someone who is impersonating a staff, arranging for adoption of a child from our home. Apparently, this person was writing to someone overseas and even attached photos of the children and the home...

Then recently, I learnt of a case of a person who complaint that we were selling our books too expensive. We spoke to a volunteer who was there and apparently, this person even tried to tamper with the price and when my volunteer realised and took the book back from him, he became verbally very hostile and threatened to complain. Following this case, I think it points to the fact that sometimes, people working in social services (volunteers included) are not being protected again abuse, threats and violence from service-users. We always talk about beneficiaries not being abused and clients' rights but we have seem to forgotten staff and volunteers' rights as well.

Did a little research and it seems that the US has recently started looking into this and made recommendations for policies to be put in place to protect staff. In the same way, made my point to my boss and recommended that policies be put in place regarding representation as well as our volunteers' right to not take abuse, threats and violence. Well, people who always take advantage of others will always exist but we can do what we can to prevent any misfortunes caused by them.