Care.com Logo
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2.9

Overall Score

LAST UPDATED: November 24th, 2023

Care.com is an online marketplace that connects families with needed services. 

Founded in 2006, Care.com is a one-stop-shop for both families in need of caregivers and caregivers themselves. The overall structure of the website is simple. Caregivers can post their services, rates, and availability. Caregivers can even contact potential clients if they feel they'd be a good match. At the same time, families can post their needs (whether it's a one-time thing or for an extended period). 

While most people believe Care.com is a babysitting service, the company offers a variety of caregiving services, including the following:

  • Errand helpers
  • Housekeepers
  • Housesitters
  • Nannies
  • Pet-sitters
  • Senior care specialists
  • Special needs caregivers
  • Tutors

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The Good

  • Tutoring Services
  • Job Opportunities
  • Safety Resources
  • Membership Plans
  • Easy-to-Use Website

Tutoring Services

To find a tutor, all you need to do is specify what kind of service you are looking for and where. Based on that, Care.com will provide you with a list of potential candidates. 

If you want, you can use Care.com's filter to narrow down your list of tutors further. Here you can choose only to view tutors if they have a background check on file or find a candidate that is willing to tutor you or your family member in your home. You can also look for a tutor specializing in a specific subject such as math, English, foreign language, etc. 

Job Opportunities

Signing up to be a tutor/caregiver on Care.com is incredibly easy. Simply click 'JOIN' and fill out your name, address, and email. 

Care.com will then ask you to list your experience and references. You will also be prompted to provide a background check, proof of certification, and other related documents/information. Keep in mind that Care.com's customer care team will need to approve all the paperwork to ensure there are no fake documents. 

Once your Caregiver profile is complete, you can set your hourly rate and availability. You can even browse through the jobs in your area. 

It doesn't cost anything to sign up and is a great resource to make some extra money.

Safety Resources

Care.com is serious about safety. The company does screen all caregivers, but it's limited. So Care.com encourages users to conduct their own screening process. Look for profiles with the CareCheck badge, conduct additional background searches, interview your candidate, check references, and more. 

If you need a bit more guidance on what to look for on a profile, Care.com has a variety of resources that can help. The company's help center has a detailed FAQ page, and the blog is an excellent place for relevant articles. 

Membership Plans

If you sign up for Care.com's basic membership, you'll be able to try out several services at no cost. You can set up an account, post a job, search and view local caregivers' profiles, and receive applications from local caregivers. 

The Premium membership includes all the basic membership features, but you'll also get contact caregivers and schedule interviews, request background checks and reply to applications and other messages. 

Easy-to-Use Website

Care.com's website is fairly straightforward and does not overwhelm you with too much information up front. Filling out Care.com's short questionnaire is, by far, the easiest way to find a candidate that fits your needs. If you want to be more specific with your search, we recommend using the filter tool to narrow down the candidates. 

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The Bad

  • Varying Rates
  • Automatic Subscription Renewal
  • Possible Scams

Varying Rates

Unfortunately, we can't tell you exactly how much you're going to pay for a tutor every month since Care.com doesn't have set pricing plans. However, we can tell you about the aspects that will factor into your final price. 

Where you live will have a significant impact on how much you pay for a tutor. 

Tutors in large cities (where the cost of living is higher) are likely to charge more. If you live in Los Angeles, California, expect to pay up anywhere from $15 to $150 per hour. 

Whereas tutors in smaller cities (for example, Gardner, Kansas) generally charge $10 to $70 per hour. 

Your location isn't the only thing affecting your final cost. Experience and availability play a major role in the entire process. A tutor with more than 10 years of experience is going to cost more than a tutor with no experience. You can also expect to pay more per hour if you need the tutor multiple times a week. 

But, before you seal the deal with a tutor, we recommend asking about the following cost-related factors:

  • Needed materials — Some tutors require you to purchase your own supplies such as books, workbooks, language tapes, etc. 
  • Cancellations/missed lessons — You may be required to pay in full for a missed or canceled lesson. Be sure to ask about the expectations for a missed or canceled lesson. 
  • Payment frequency — Many tutors will offer a discounted rate for multiple lessons. Ask about a price reduction if you're paying for a full month (or more) in advance.

To ensure you're getting a fair rate, we highly recommend checking out Care.com's Rate Calculators. These calculators are fantastic at helping you find an appropriate rate based on your tutor's service, experience, hours, and zip code. 

Automatic Subscription Renewal

Before diving in and purchasing a premium subscription plan with Care.com, make sure you're up-to-date on the company's policies. One of the most common complaints against Care.com is that customers were billed after they canceled their accounts. This is frustrating because consumers expect the charges to stop once they cancel.

However, Care.com's terms and conditions state:

"If you sign up for a payment plan that allows you to be charged monthly over the subscription period and you decide to cancel your subscription during the subscription period, you acknowledge and agree that you will continue to be billed for the subscription on a monthly basis until its originally scheduled expiration date."

Possible Scams

While Care.com does a decent job providing consumers with various resources to avoid a potential scam, it's not impossible.

If you're not careful and skimp on the background check, you could end up losing your money. We recommend choosing tutors with Care.com's CareCheck badge and running your own background check. 

Although you may run across untrustworthy and dishonest profiles on the site, the company itself is entirely legitimate. 

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The Bottom Line

Care.com is one of the most widely recognized companies in the caregiving industry. While the company is generally thought of as a babysitting provider, Care.com can connect you with nannies, tutors, house-sitters, pet-sitters, and more. 

As for the company's tutoring services, there are plenty of opportunities for job seekers and plenty of tutors to choose from. Whether you're a parent or student, you should have no trouble finding someone who can help with math, English, science, etc.

While the company's basic membership is free, you'll need to upgrade to a Premium membership to send messages. The premium membership fees aren't the cheapest, and you'll need to keep in mind that you are paying this on top of whatever you are paying your tutor. 

The most common complaint against Care.com is in regards to the company's automatic renewal subscription. If you sign up for the Premium membership, you agree to the subscription terms. This means that you will continue to be billed even if you cancel during the subscription period until the original subscription period is over. Many customers felt that this wasn't clearly stated and were frustrated when they kept getting billed even though they had canceled. 

Overall, Care.com does a great job of connecting people. Whether you're a parent looking to find a tutor for a student or a child looking to find help for an aging parent, Care.com is a great place to look. 

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Star Rating

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2.2

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11 Reviews

Review Breakdown

5 grade

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4 grade

27%

3 grade

18%

2 grade

0%

1 grade

55%

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Michelle Thomas Anaheim, CA

I am not ecstatic about this company or site. First they have a terrible website. It has problems. On my computer it has a section overlaping the main area. The worst is that I have care taker and tutoring which my hours available for caregiver jobs is different from tutoring hours and days but...whether I choose to put hours for care giver or tutor which ever one I choose the hours are the same on both profiles. Now does it seem dumb that I tutor from 2pm to.12am. Yes it is not good because I have the caregiver times and days for both because it defaults to that but yeah they need to fix some website design flaws.

4 months ago

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Emily Higgins Chandler, AZ

We are part of the business side of care.com. I have called 100 families and have only had 2 enroll. We were guaranteed at least 1 out of every 20 I believe it was, clearly those numbers are falsified. We have done everything we were told to do, call, text, email, etc and most families never responded even still. I attempted to contact Tim, one of the sales managers over the course of October. I was told he had been out of work sick and he would give me a call back by Karen one of the sales people we worked with. That was on October 19. I received a call from him on October 20 but was in a classroom and interviews and couldn't take his call. Since then I have called and left 4-5 messages and still no response. I contacted Karen and she said she would have him call me this past Friday, I never got a call. I texted her letting her know and attempted to call her and her answer was that she was on a conference call and she would call me back shortly. I waited about 20 min and didn't receive a call and so I tried again. She told me she still had an hour and a half left in her work day and she would give me a call. In the mean time I could call or email the support team. Obviously I am not trusting them to respond to me in any proper amount of time if I email because, well to date they have failed to call me back (Tim the manager and the support team that I left 2 messages with). Well at 3:51 pm az time, nearing the end of her shift I tried calling, what a shock no answer. I called 26 times and no answer. Now she has blocked my number, Tim will not call me back, and surprise I haven't received any sort of communication from the support team after 2 messages and an email. They have no problem charging my card though still. I attempted to delete my debit card info so they couldn't charge us, because at this point they have failed to uphold their end of the deal, but I can't delete it from the file. There is no way to cancel unless I speak with someone, yet I have to leave a voicemail and never get a live person. I have reported them to the BBB, I am going to have to contact my bank to claim fraudulent charges so they can't charge me any further. This is insane and not how a company should be doing business.

4 months ago

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Fernando Delgado Tempe, AZ

I like that this provides me a more secure and narrow search for tutors for my son. This is more convenient to interact with the right person and I'm excited to see how well he's progressed thanks to this app. I only recommend lowering the cost of the premium.

5 years ago

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Jen W Columbia, MD

This is a complete waste of money - do not waste your time or money on this website service. We signed up to find a nanny to watch our children, and received a lot of interest from nannies registered on this website. We set-up interviews and every single one of the applicants were a no show. We soon realized that CARE.com pays for the top 10 websites for reviews on their company on google.com search engine - you need to really search to find the accurate, honest reviews which reflect the reality of how awful this company is. After two weeks they refused to refund us (even though we were not able to find ONE applicant to return a call, or show up for an interview, and we had upwards of 50 applicants). We even asked if we could just pay for one month of service instead of the full year, to get SOME money back - and they refused. This is a scam, DO NOT WASTE YOUR MONEY - you will regret it.

2 years ago

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Nicole Johnson Portland, OR

Care.com seems to be well-known as a place where people who need connections can find help. However, when I was looking for a job using this website, I found it difficult to get in touch with people beyond just one initial flood of questions at my first job posting. Ultimately, I did not use Care.com to get a job.

3 years ago Edited September 14, 2021

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Amanda George IL

This website is definitely worth the cost. I've used it for about 5 months and I love it!

8 months ago Edited July 19, 2023

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Natacia Hanson Swartz Creek, MI

The company has the worst customer service!!!. It takes weeks to hear back from anyone because it’s all online. They say 48 hours and it was 3 weeks each time. There is no way to speak to a live agent. I was extremely dissatisfied.

2 years ago

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Kazik Friedrich Chesham, BKM

There are plenty of fake accounts on the site, very few people respond to messages. Care.com will not send you invoices/payment confirmations and their "1 month membership" option is actually a subscription, they charged me £300 and provided no useful services. Customer support is extremely poor. Their competition is much better.

2 years ago

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Morgan Tennant Idaho Falls, ID

Care.com is a good website to find people to tutor. Expectations from both parties are available to view which makes finding a good match easy!

2 years ago

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Angel Diaz ,

I paid for the upgrade and I never got a response from any tutors I canceled the upgrade and they still charge me for 2 moths Don’t use this website theirs other ways to find good tutors no company phone number to speak to a live person

3 years ago

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Iris Latteral Saint Joseph, MN

Never found the help we needed, auto billed me for months before I notice(my fault) but never sent a renewal notice or receipt. Will not refund, don't do it.

2 years ago