This company is exceptionally dishonest. Do not trust the lies your recruiter will use to con you into a truly pathetic arrangement. Firstly, your wage is not hourly based as they claim initially. You will find that during a shift of x hours that you will indeed be very busy working your tail off for the full x hours, however, you will not be paid for your time. There is a 15 minute period between lessons wherein you are expected to chat cordially with students as they leave the online classroom, which extends the 45 minute class by about five minutes on average. Then you are required to grade the class and write comments before preparing for the next lesson. You will be hard pressed to use the bathroom or what not if you need a break. So you see, their hourly wage is a lie. You will work the hours, but you will not be paid fairly or honestly for your time. Simply, the hourly rate they state is an out and out lie. And that's how they do business. This should be your first big red flag as to what this company stands for.
The bonus system is a great lie as well. Asian students, as a cultural nuance, will almost never give a 9 out of 10 rating. Your final rating for each session is based on an average of all the students who in the lesson who actually provide a rating. Your rating is then rounded down, yes that's right, the company policy is to ROUND DOWN your rating. If you happened to average an 8.9 rating for a particular lesson, you will be paid a bonus based on a rating of 8. Bonuses below 8 are negligible, if not insulting. So basically if you are really good you will get ratings of 7/8, and always be rounded down to the 7's. To make matters worse, if just one student in the class gives a poor rating, your rating is rounded down to 0. Yep, 0. If five students give you a ten, and just one a five, 0 bonus for you for that lesson. They will try to entice you with this bonus system, but be in the know, it's a lie too, just like the hourly rate.
Teaching large groups of enthusiastic Chinese students is draining and tiring, and at the end of the day it's just not worth sub-minimum wages (Western standards). Meanwhile this company is hitting the stratosphere of profitability, a new Chinese tech giant backed by even bigger giants. By taking a job at these pathetic wages you are hurting every teacher in the industry whilst aiding these dishonest corporations, the likes of abc, in lining their greedy pockets with millions upon millions.
Don't do it. Don't be lazy. If you want to teach online, use italki, verbalplanet, buddyschool, etc. Demand a proper rate of for your teaching. It's easy to use these sites and you will get paid what you are worth. Don't contribute to these corporate shysters at Tutorgroup. Please don't support any of these abc companies that aren't willing to share the income and pay a proper teacher's salary and living wage.
