Work My Price: the name says it all

One of the most oft discussed topics in The Force Field Forums begins with an inquiry about a new or previously unknown national contractor or web-based service platform. The topic poster found it either through contact via another service platform, another tech, an unsolicited e-mail, or from a phone call out of the blue from the company purportedly recruiting techs for specific work. You can easily pick out these types of discussions in forums as they usually begin with the topic title <Company Name> – Anyone ever heard of them?

So it was no surprise to find a topic recently on a new service platform called Work My Price. I first ran across it in December and I immediately put it aside as it seemed to be a work in progress and still “under construction”.

I ran across it again today on LinkedIn and took another look at the site to check its progress. Apparently there is still nothing going on. But this time I was just a little annoyed.

It wasn’t the lack of progress made on the site since my last visit, although that was rather interesting, given the promotion on its LinkedIn page. It was the fact that it was still there at all.

Work My Price consists of one landing page and – ignoring the link to Facebook at the top – one link to a service provider sign up form. Nothing else. Nothing about the company itself, no contact information, nothing that you would expect to find on any other legitimate service platform to give you any idea who was actually running the operation, if there really was an operation.

But there was a lot of hype on that page, aka previews of things to come, such as a directory and the ability to create a profile in it, the ability to upload work credentials and photos of prior projects for the perusal of potential customers, the ability to recieve notifications for work, the ability to book jobs to fill open slots in your work schedule and the ability to build a reputation on their system. According to the page, the site was still under construction, but they were actively recruiting service providers and, as expected, registration was free.

Heard it all before? Of course. It’s what most of the other platforms already offer. But that wasn’t what got under my skin. It was the line that described Work My Price – this line (the tired line we’ve all heard before): An online marketplace where service providers and consumers connect to get the job done.
And this one: …provides an alternative for service providers to earn business without the expensive costs of advertising.

Okay, that was more than just a little annoying. It may be an online marketplace (isn’t everything, now?) but “an alternative to expensive advertising”? OnForce doesn’t even use that one anymore. That’s so turn of the century it’s almost absurd.

Seriously, who even uses that as an excuse to join a service platform in this day and age? The Internet and everything associated with it, cheap web hosting, ten minute web design applications, free directories, and, most notably, social networking, have made traditional mainstream advertising and door-to-door soliciting a thing of the past. Over two thirds of the population have access to the world wide web and that’s where you will usually find them shopping for products and services first these days. It’s cheap and easy to put up a virtual sign, and few people read ads in a newspaper anymore, so why bother advertising where people aren’t looking? It’s 2012, get with the times.

It gets better. I visited the LinkedIn page, and what I found was amusing, confusing and disturbing. The owner of the account is listed as the company and not the person who owns it, so who ever owns the company apparently does not want to make himself or herself known. Not a good sign.

The page also features a video animation. One of the characters in the video claims to be getting a lot of business through Work My Price, which is at the very least disingenuous, since in reality the site technically isn’t even operational.

But what really got me were the recommendations. There were two of them, both testimonials, no less. What? Testimonials? From a web site that isn’t even operational? Yep. One from a Jamie H. and another from a Daniel B., and both stated they “hired WorkMyPrice.com as a Business Consultant in 2011, and hired WorkMyPrice.com more than once”. No kidding. Perhaps these are the owners of the company?

It turns out that Jamie H. is Jamie Hyman, identified as the owner of Work My Price. Daniel B. is Daniel Bellamy, who apparently works for a bank. Both reside in the same area of North Carolina and both attended the same state university at around the same time, which leads one to think they both actually know each other and are directly involved with Work My Price.

The overhyped site. The tired old lines. The lack of contact information. The non-disclosure of ownership. They are all obvious red flags. But there is one thing about Work My Price that bothers me more: The name itself.

As an onsite field technician, when you hear the term “work my price”, what image does that project in your mind? What comes to mine is another platform that empowers the buyer to low-ball work below reasonable rates and restrict the service provider from enforcing his own. This is really bad for both buyer and provider because it lowers the chances the buyer will get a truly qualified tech because most won’t work for peanuts and it raises the risk to the buyer because, chances are, the more inexperienced or unqualified “techs” will.

Now, to be fair, Work My Price seems to be aimed at the general “handyman” market; the plumbers, carpenters, brick layers, etc. and not IT professionals, although they do have a category on their registration form for “Computers and Electronics”. But this certainly isn’t a novel idea for that market, either. Service Magic is the first one that comes to my mind, and having been through the Service Magic experience first hand, I don’t think the market needs another one of these, in my humble opinion.

Less experienced IT techs may work for “your price” or next to nothing, but most licensed and reputable professionals such as plumbers, electricians, carpenters and other contract laborers won’t. That leaves the local unlicensed, unbonded “Uncle Joe” handyman to pick up the slack. I’ve been stung by enough of these guys myself to know not to go there again.

So this site looks cheesy or downright bogus. There are a lot of them out there. I’ve been ranting on this one. What’s the big deal?

What bothers me most of all is the registration form. It’s asking for your vitals. I’ve warned you about this before and I’m about to do it again. If the site has no legitimate company identifiers, no contact information and no apparent activity, do not fill out the registration form. Granted, this one doesn’t ask you for your social security number, but you have no idea what they will do with what they have.

They also have a field to input the names and e-mail addresses of other service providers you would like to refer. That opens up another potential can of worms I won’t get into at this time.

There are a number of these types of web-based service platforms out there already. Do we really need another one? I don’t think so. And I don’t think Work My Price is even a valid one anyway, at least not yet. But the red flags are everywhere on this one, so unless and until those flags go away, I would not recommend registering for Work My Price. It’s just not worth the risk, at any price.