Care.comReviews of care.com

As a caregiver and child development professional, I'd been using Care.com for 10 years. I have watched the platform evolve from a robust job finding tool into a mostly-broken app filled with hollow job postings and constant cash grabs. Want to respond to messages? Got to be a paying member. But the family has to pay also...you can send the messages, but if you want to read 'em you gotta pay and so do they! Very scammy. Additionally, families who join the platform automatically have a job posting created for them as part of the registration, which clogs up the actual job listings with "We're looking now for a nanny in [location] who is CPR certified and has college degree", posts from families who often don't even realize they have a job posting because it doesn't notify them. So of course, if you take time and apply to these jobs, you never get an answer, and I never applied to them anyway because it was a clear waste of my time, plus how do I know it's a good fit for me when there are zero details about the kids, what they like, their ages, etc? The messaging component and review component are both barely functioning. I regularly got notifications that I had messages or "job requests" that didn't exist. "Job requests" are actually a scam in my opinion, as often times the app would send a notification which made it seem like a family messaged you inquiring about your availability, when in fact they had not and the message was automated. I had a family hire me off one of these who clearly explained that they never reached out, the message was automated and completely un-requested by them. So the Care.com app is pretending to be your family and messaging caregivers for you? A bit creepy. When a real human did send the message, it often didn't arrive, or when it did arrive it arrived days later. Notifications were delayed as well, and some job requests expired after 24 hours, so by the time you got a notification, the request wasn't available anymore. Not to mention they penalized you in suarch standings for your reply speed, but unless you check messages every 30 minutes you'd miss one because notifications were so broken. I had families write me reviews and they never showed up. I had families go to write reviews and get told they couldn't be submitted because they already wrote me one when they didn't. Again, when reviews are so important to search rankings, this level of dysfunction is inexcusable as it actively hurts your chances of being hired. So overall, the app is broken and borders on a large-scale scam, messaging works poorly, reviews are broken, and ethics at corporate appear to be non-existent. You pay money for a service but the service is almost unusable. The FTC has actually taken action against whis company for their scams in the past and I'd love to see them take further action in the future. You'd be better served putting up posters on telephone poles looking for childcare or a caregiver and stapling the money below the sign. You're throwing money away and getting nothing in return either way.

The hiring process leads you to have to pay to continue the application form. The application is not free.

Subscribed to premium service with an auto renewal every three months. Tried to unsubscribe and you literally cannot find where to do it anywhere on the website. It sends you round in circles Have had to advise my credit card company to dispute any further renewals and treat as fraud. Don't use.

If I could give 0 stars, I would. I signed up for what I believed was a one-month subscription and did not realize it would automatically renew every three months. I stopped using the service shortly after joining because I was unable to find reliable care through the platform. What was most frustrating is that I never received any email notification that my membership was renewing or that another charge was about to occur. Most subscription services send a reminder before a renewal, especially for a charge of this size. By the time I noticed the charge on my credit card, I had been billed $600. I contacted customer support right away to explain the situation, but was told that their customer agreement does not allow refunds. I understand companies need policies, but the lack of renewal notification combined with the inability to issue any refund for a service that wasn’t being used feels very disappointing and not particularly customer-friendly. I hope the company will reconsider how they handle renewals and customer support in situations like this. March 10th Update: Below they responded to this review. Upon contacting them they put me on hold, called back an hour later and said the claim was denied. No one heard my case, they made zero effort. The replies seem to be for show.

I once looked at care.com for services and never logged in again. It has billed my credit care every month and I discovered only due to card cancellation. It should be illegal to do recurring charges when services are not used. I asked for an adjustment and was told it was non-refundable, even I have not accessed the site in a year.

Biggest scam. Looking to work as a pet sitter, went through annoying set up. Providing my basic information only to be shocked when to have the privilege of working for the scammers at that company, I had to pay a subscription to start, then keep paying every month after that. Wow, how can thieves not be ashamed and be so blatant about stealing from people looking to earn money in exchange for working hard. I feel bad for the people that really needed to make money and got scammed. No one should fall for this evil scam. This company should be banned and the owners arrested. Update 3.6.26... Care.com wrote a reply pretending to not understand that a legitimate business would not charge employee's for the privilege of working for it. Care.com played naive to the fact that the owners are scamming people who work there, making them pay the scammers upfront before being hired and then having to pay monthly for the honor and blessing of working there. Outrageous, the people in charge of such an awful business want to pretend like they don't know charging employee's to work, is unscrupulous, evil and should be a crime. I'm sure they will claim they don't employ the people who are there trying to make money to survive hard times. They will claim, the workers are independent contractors. I say more bull💩 from people who don't care at care.com(ironic💯), which receives a share of the money earned by the employees but that's not greedy enough, the owners want more money that wasn't earned by them but stolen. The taking advantage and deceiving people who most likely are desperate, needing money is cruel. Which leaves the oppressed workers feeling used and exploited by greedy individuals that don't know anything about working hard for a paycheck. Making employee's pay to be able to work for a business is despicable.

I tried to find work for 3 and a half months. I only got one days work after paying for their premium membership. For me it was a total waste of time and money. There are way too many caregivers applying for the same job.

I purchased a one-month subscription, which I understood would expire after that one month. However, I was charged the following month. I was not aware I would need to cancel, as the product was presented as limited to one month. I reached out to the only support email I could find immediately, only to get an auto-reply that they don't look at it. I tried navigating their contact page without luck, finding no contact information or a refund form. I feel like they are misleading how they present their products and intentionally impossible to get in touch with.