Care.com to pay customers $8.5M in FTC settlement for deceiving caregivers, families

The U.S. Federal Trade Commission (FTC) is requiring Care.com, a platform for gig workers in the elder-care and childcare space, to pay $8.5 million in refunds for deceiving caregivers who were looking for jobs, and making it difficult for families to cancel their paid memberships.

The agency said on Monday that the company’s marketing messages misled customers about the number of jobs that were available on its platform and the amount of money the jobs pay.

Separately, the FTC said Care.com made it complicated to cancel memberships, sometimes guiding users to multi-page questionnaires and warnings, and ordered it to provide a “simple cancellation method.”

Care.com released a statement saying it settled with the FTC to keep its focus on helping families and caregivers, despite originally being “fully prepared to litigate for the next several years if necessary.”