The Federal Commerce Fee is mailing checks totaling greater than $2.7 million to 62,893 staff who had been charged charges and fines by Useful Applied sciences, the facet hustle platform now working as Angi Providers.
The funds stem from a January 2025 settlement between the FTC, the New York Legal professional Normal, and Useful over promoting that inflated how a lot staff might earn on the platform.
Why It Issues
Hundreds of thousands of People use facet hustles to earn further earnings, and the marketed pay charges are sometimes the principle cause they enroll.
The FTC’s case reveals how far these numbers can drift from actuality: Useful marketed handyman and furnishings meeting jobs at as much as $45 per hour, however greater than 90% of staff earned greater than $20 per hour beneath the marketed fee. Garden care jobs had been promoted at as much as $62 per hour, a fee fewer than 10% of staff truly reached.
The Particulars
Based on the FTC’s grievance, Useful’s issues went past inflated pay claims:
- Delayed pay: Useful marketed that staff can be paid “as quickly because the job is completed.” In actuality, new staff had been paid seven days after finishing work by default, and getting paid quicker required an additional charge.
- $50 no-show fines: When prospects instructed staff to not come however by no means canceled in Useful’s system, Useful commonly fined staff $50 though the employee did nothing improper. Avoiding the effective required a course of the FTC known as sophisticated and poorly disclosed, together with granting GPS entry and ready greater than half-hour on the job website.
- Hidden charges: The grievance says inadequately disclosed charges and fines withheld tens of millions of {dollars} from staff’ wages total.
Underneath the settlement, Useful paid $2.95 million and should now get staff’ specific, knowledgeable consent earlier than charging any charge or effective, and again up earnings claims with what a typical employee truly makes.
How This Connects
We reviewed Useful as a facet hustle app and flagged that real-world earnings rely closely on job availability and the platform’s charge construction — a niche the FTC’s case now quantifies.
Our reporting on the finest facet hustles constantly finds that platform-advertised charges sit on the prime quality: supply drivers common $20.33 per hour, and handyman work usually pays $20 to $50 per hour.
It is necessary for potential facet hustlers to grasp that many instances, marketed gig charges are advertising, not a pay stub. Earlier than committing to any platform, search for the median employee’s earnings (not the ceiling) and browse the charge schedule carefully. The FTC’s motion indicators regulators are watching earnings claims throughout the gig economic system, however the first line of protection remains to be a skeptical learn of the recruiting pitch.
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