Young people with financial troubles are looking at sugar dating as a way to supplement their incomes but these kinds of arrangements aren’t without their pitfalls.

The idea is, usually a younger person gets in a relationship with a ‘Sugar Daddy or Sugar Mama’, an older person that’s well off.

The Better Business Bureau says it’s opened up a grey area between dating and sex work. Seeking.com is one website where people looking for this kind of agreement.

The Bureau’s Neesha Hothi says there’s scammers out there, so be careful sharing information, like pictures you already have on you social media.

“Once you grab a photo and put a reverse Google search, you can find where that photo is elsewhere online, it gives a lot of your information away very quickly. They can find out your friends and family etc, so in those beginning phases be a little bit more cautious about your information because you are genuinely putting yourself out there for just about anyone.”

Hothi adds young people need to be careful as some potential partners aren’t what they appear to be.

She points to a young woman, a post secondary student from Pitt Meadows, who had been contacted by a woman in the U.S. that claimed to be lonely after her divorce and was to provide a weekly allowance in exchange for regular phone calls.

“She’d been promised that an accountant would be sending her money but then she kind of go cold feet because they were saying ‘Oh here we’re sending you this but part of it has to be sent off to an orphanage or you have to send part of this away.’ So, it seemed a little bit shady and so you’ve got to be mindful of what is someone asking you to do with that information so be careful with all those things.”

Hothi says you shouldn’t look at sugar dating as a sole source of income and never do anything that you feel pressured to do.

You can find more information on the BBB’s website