Independent Contractor pay and hours?

[bananaboat]

The business is in Indiana, I work in Illinois.

I work for a text message search company, ChaCha. When I signed up 5 months ago the pay was 20 cents for each question. They have notified everyone starting August 14th we will now get 10 cents per question without any restrictions on how many searches we do. However if we complete 300 searches the previous week then you qualify to get what we normally got 20 cents. Their technical department is planning to count each week who does how many questions so the following week your pay will be adjusted or not adjusted if you didn't make 300 questions that week. There has never been a minimum before for how many questions you answer.

In my internet search I found you cannot hire one as an independent contractor and then be told how much you have to work, correct? Yet I see though that they are marketing the 20 cent pay as a BONUS for dedicated workers so technically they aren't forcing you to make 300 searches a week if you don't want because you can still get 10 cents a question. But when I entered the job I didn't sign up for 10 cents!

Their terms of service also states

b. Payment Processing; Payment Service. In connection with the provision of Services by you, you shall be entitled to receive the compensation stated in the Policies that appear on ChaCha's web site, which Policies may be changed at any time, in ChaCha's sole discretion.

Is that their loophole? Surely there's always ways around one?

 

[cbg]

If you are legitimately an IC, employment law does not apply. It would depend on the exact wording of your contract. You will need to take the contract to an attorney in your state for review.

If it turns out that you are not legitimately an IC but should have been an employee, you can check with the DOL of the state in which you actually did the work, what recourse you have. Or the attorney will be able to tell you.

 

[tc6669]

ChaCha

I also work for ChaCha and I read somewhere that in order to be an independent contractor your client (not customer) cannot provide you with the tools you need to do your job, otherwise you'd be an employee. You need to download a ChaCha toolbar in order to do the searches, does this constitute a tool?
Also, there is a Quality Control system that checks the work of any guide that completes more than 200 searches in a given week in order to see if they qualify for Top Guide. Anyone with more than 200 per week gets a QC report letting them know if you qualify for top guide pay or not & why. Some of us that do well over 200 aren't getting these reports which means we aren't eligable for TG (this could be due to a system error not human malice). It is next to impossible to get any kind of answers out of ChaCha for this & most other issues in a timely fashion (say within a few weeks). Which can snowball into other weeks pay. Even if we are LEGITIMATELY private contractors, which I have great doubts about, does this constitute breach of contract or fraud on their part? To me it seems no different than someone offering a prize or incentive that is never intended to be given out.
ChaCha is based in Carmel, IN, I'm in Gainesville, FL

 

[cbg]

You're taking that much too literally. Who provides the tools, the employer or the employee/contractor, is one INDICATOR among many as to whether you are an employee or a contractor, but it is by no means a cut and dried, black and white, yes or not deal breaker.