Care.com: The Caregiving Platform That Inflated Available Job Counts and Posted Jobs That Didn't Exist to Drive Paid Subscriptions

Care.com Inc., the online marketplace connecting families seeking caregivers with individuals seeking caregiving work, agreed to pay $8.5 million to resolve findings that it misrepresented the number of available caregiving jobs on its platform and maintained job listings on the site for positions that were no longer available or had never been genuine openings — creating a false picture of job availability that drove job seekers to upgrade to paid subscriptions to contact employers about positions they would not be able to obtain.DOCUMENTED

Care.com's business model relies on fees from both families seeking caregivers and individuals seeking caregiving work. Job seekers who create accounts on the platform can view available job listings for free but are required to upgrade to a paid subscription to contact the families posting those listings. The platform's value to job seekers depends critically on the availability and accuracy of the job listings they see — if listings are inflated by outdated or non-genuine postings, job seekers pay subscription fees to access opportunities that do not actually exist.DOCUMENTED

The Job Count Inflation

Care.com displayed a count of available jobs in a job seeker's geographic area on its platform — a number that was intended to give job seekers a sense of the opportunity available to them in their market. Regulators found that this count was calculated in ways that inflated the apparent availability: including listings that had passed their intended active period, counting positions from families who had filled the role but not removed their listing, and including positions from accounts that were not actively monitoring the platform. The resulting count was higher than the number of genuinely open positions a job seeker had a realistic chance of being hired for.DOCUMENTED

The job count is a significant piece of information for a job seeker deciding whether to pay for a subscription — a market with many available positions is more likely to generate a successful placement than one with few. When the displayed count overstates availability, job seekers overestimate the value of upgrading and pay subscription fees for access to a market that is less productive than they were led to believe. For caregivers who depend on finding placement work as a primary income source, the cost of a subscription that fails to connect them with genuine opportunities is a meaningful financial harm.DOCUMENTED

Stale and Non-Genuine Listings

Individual job listings on Care.com remained visible to job seekers after the underlying positions were no longer available. When a family found a caregiver through the platform — or through another channel — they did not necessarily remove their listing, and Care.com's systems did not automatically remove or expire listings based on age or inactivity. Job seekers who paid for subscriptions to contact employers about specific listings frequently found that the position was no longer available, that the family had found someone else, or that the family's account was no longer active and their messages were going unread.DOCUMENTED

The harm from stale listings is compounded by the subscription model: a job seeker pays a monthly fee for subscription access and then uses that access to apply to listings, many of which turn out to be for positions that are not available. The subscription fee is paid regardless of how many of the applications generate responses or result in employment — meaning that the proportion of active to stale listings directly affects the subscription's value, and overstating that proportion through stale listings overstates the subscription's value.DOCUMENTED

Caregivers who paid for Care.com subscriptions to reach families posting job listings found that many of the positions they applied for had already been filled — while Care.com's displayed job count implied a level of market activity that the genuinely available listings did not support.

Care Workers and Platform Accountability

Care.com's deception fell particularly heavily on a workforce — individual caregivers including nannies, childcare providers, elder care workers, and housekeepers — that is predominantly female, often immigrant, frequently without the resources to absorb the cost of subscription fees that fail to generate employment, and without the market alternatives that would allow them to easily evaluate competing platforms. The combination of financial vulnerability and platform dependency makes accurate marketplace representation especially important for this workforce.REVIEWED

The consent order requires Care.com to implement listing accuracy systems that remove or mark inactive listings within defined timeframes, to display job counts that reflect only active, genuine positions, and to offer a prorated subscription refund to job seekers who contact a defined number of employers without receiving any responses within a specified period. The $8.5 million in consumer redress was distributed to job seekers who paid subscriptions during the covered period; individuals who paid Care.com subscription fees during this period and did not receive individual payments should review the settlement website for information about any supplemental claiming process.DOCUMENTED

Protecting Yourself in Online Job Marketplaces

Care workers and job seekers using any online labor marketplace can take several steps to protect themselves from the subscription-for-stale-listings problem. Before paying for any premium subscription that unlocks employer contact, use the free tier to assess the ratio of responsive to non-responsive listings by looking at listing dates and activity indicators. Active, genuine listings will typically have been posted recently and will show employer engagement signals if the platform provides them. Research the platform's reputation specifically from the job seeker perspective — not just from employer or general reviews — by searching for complaints from care workers about the platform's job listing quality. Consider whether the platform offers a trial period or a refund mechanism if the subscription does not result in any employer responses, and document your application activity in case you need to request a refund. The Federal Trade Commission's consumer complaint database and state attorney general complaint registries are searchable and can reveal whether a platform has a pattern of complaints from job seekers about listing accuracy or subscription value.

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