MyOutDesk Review: Pay, Requirements, and What It's Actually Like to Work There

MyOutDesk sells businesses a turnkey virtual staffing service. To the people who actually do the work, it’s a different pitch entirely: a full-time, work-from-home job with a US client, built around strict vetting and a flat monthly billing rate you never see broken down.

Here’s what MyOutDesk actually pays, who it hires, what the application involves, and how it stacks up against the other VA companies candidates weigh alongside it.

How Does MyOutDesk Compare to Other VA Companies?

Before the details, here’s the side-by-side view most candidates want first.

Selectivity numbers vary by source: MyOutDesk states it hires only its top 1% of applicants, while Belay reports accepting roughly 3%. Both figures come from each company’s own published materials, not an independent audit.

The core difference between MyOutDesk and a listings site like OnlineJobs.ph: MyOutDesk is a managed staffing company, not an open marketplace. You don’t build a public profile and pitch strangers. MyOutDesk recruits, vets, and places you with one client, then manages that relationship, payroll, and support on the business side. The tradeoff, as with any managed VA company, is that MyOutDesk keeps the spread between what the client pays and what you earn.

What Does MyOutDesk Pay Virtual Assistants?

MyOutDesk doesn’t publish a standard hourly rate for its virtual assistants. What is public is the client side of the equation: per MyOutDesk’s own site, a full-time VA placement runs about $1,988 a month on a month-to-month plan, dropping to roughly $1,848 a month on a 6-month commitment and about $1,788 a month on a 12-month commitment. That full-time rate works out to roughly $10-11 an hour billed to the client, according to third-party pricing breakdowns from Wishup and virtualwizards.io that track MyOutDesk’s published rates.

What the VA actually takes home is a smaller slice of that. Per an anonymous employee review on Indeed, assistants are told they can’t discuss pay with their client because “your salary is only 30% of what the client is paying for.” Applied to MyOutDesk’s own $1,788-1,988 monthly range, that works out to roughly $535-600 a month for a full-time role, before any country-specific adjustments.

Third-party salary estimators tell a wider, messier story. ZipRecruiter’s aggregated listing data puts the average hourly pay for a “MyOutDesk job” in the US at $26.34, with a reported range of $8.89 to $61.78 an hour, but that figure blends MyOutDesk’s small US-based corporate staff (sales, marketing, leadership) with its much larger offshore VA workforce, so it overstates what a Philippines-based assistant typically earns. Glassdoor separately lists an estimated average of about $25 an hour for a “Virtual Assistant” role at MyOutDesk in Manila, which runs well above both the 30%-of-client-rate math above and the $5-8/hour range typical of Philippine-based VA work more broadly. Treat that Glassdoor figure as a thin, self-reported sample rather than a reliable benchmark.

What Does It Take to Get Hired at MyOutDesk?

MyOutDesk recruits most heavily from the Philippines, with additional talent hubs in Latin America and Africa, for long-term, full-time, work-from-home roles supporting US-based clients, not freelance gigs or part-time work. Per the company’s own about page, every applicant goes through FBI-grade background checks, a dual-stage live video interview over two synchronized camera feeds (one phone, one computer, meant to catch staged footage or proxy interviewees), government ID verification, and skills and personality assessments. MyOutDesk states that only the top 1% of applicants make it through.

That screening bar shows up in how applicants describe the process. Threads in Filipino job-seeker Facebook groups and on r/buhaydigital reference multi-step “system checks,” public group interviews, and waiting periods between stages, consistent with a company built around volume hiring plus a rigorous funnel, rather than a quick one-call hire. If you’re applying from the Philippines, expect the process to take longer than a single interview and to ask for documentation most freelance platforms never request.

Roles lean toward admin support, inside sales, customer service, bookkeeping, and marketing, with particularly deep bench strength in real estate: the niche MyOutDesk was built around in 2008 under founder Daniel Ramsey, who came from a real estate background himself. The company has since expanded into healthcare, legal, and finance support, but real estate transaction coordination and lead follow-up remain where it has the longest track record.

That real estate depth matters if you’re choosing where to apply. A company that has placed thousands of transaction coordinators and prospecting assistants over nearly two decades has more established training material, client expectations, and internal playbooks for that specific role than a generalist platform does. Per MyOutDesk’s own site, the company now reports more than 8,500 business clients globally and holds SOC 2 Type 1 certification, a data-security standard that matters mostly to the client side but also signals the scale of the operation you’d be joining. If your background is outside admin, sales, or real estate, that depth works less in your favor. MyOutDesk’s screening is built around proven fit for its established role categories, not open-ended skill matching.

Is MyOutDesk a Full-Time Job or Freelance Work?

MyOutDesk places full-time or near-full-time dedicated assistants, not freelancers picking up part-time gigs. Per the company’s own careers page, Philippines-based roles are described as “long-term, work-from-home careers,” not project work: you’re matched to one client and stay there, rather than juggling multiple short-term engagements the way you would on a marketplace like OnlineJobs.ph or Upwork.

Looking at more than one VA company before you decide? See how MyOutDesk stacks up against the hiring side of the equation in our Belay review and Time Etc review. Both cover pay, requirements, and what the work is actually like.

That structure cuts both ways. You get stability: one client, a steady monthly workload, and MyOutDesk handling the client relationship and payroll logistics. You give up flexibility: there’s no official part-time tier, so if you want to work 15-20 hours a week while keeping a second client elsewhere, MyOutDesk’s model isn’t built for that the way an open marketplace is.

Verdict: Should You Apply to MyOutDesk?

MyOutDesk makes sense if you want a long-term, full-time, work-from-home role with a US client and you’re comfortable with a slower, more document-heavy vetting process in exchange for stability and a company handling the client relationship for you. It’s a weaker fit if you want part-time hours, want to set your own rate, or want full visibility into what your client is actually paying for your time. MyOutDesk’s flat monthly billing model and its reported 30%-of-client-rate pay structure mean you’re trading transparency for a steadier placement.

Write down what you actually need before you apply anywhere. If stability and one long-term client matter more than rate transparency or flexible hours, MyOutDesk’s model fits. If you’d rather know exactly what a client pays for your time, or want to run two or three smaller clients instead of one, a marketplace model or a company with a published, guaranteed hourly rate will likely suit you better.

Before applying, compare the tradeoffs against Belay and Time Etc, which recruit US/UK-based assistants on different pay structures, or OnlineJobs.ph if you’d rather pitch Philippines-based employers directly and negotiate your own rate.

Frequently Asked Questions

How much does MyOutDesk pay virtual assistants?

MyOutDesk doesn’t publish a standard VA hourly rate. An anonymous Indeed employee review states VA pay is “only 30% of what the client is paying,” which works out to roughly $535-600 a month against MyOutDesk’s own published client rate of $1,788-1,988 a month for a full-time placement.

Is MyOutDesk legit?

Yes. MyOutDesk has operated since 2008, states it has served 8,500+ clients per its own site, and has achieved SOC 2 Type 1 certification. Its hiring process includes FBI-grade background checks and dual-stage video identity verification, which are stricter screening steps than most open freelance marketplaces require.

Does MyOutDesk hire outside the Philippines?

Yes. MyOutDesk’s largest talent hub has historically been the Philippines, and per its own about page, it has since expanded recruiting to Latin America and Africa. Its US-based openings are limited to corporate roles like sales, marketing, and operations, posted separately on ZipRecruiter.

How hard is it to get hired at MyOutDesk?

MyOutDesk states that only its top 1% of applicants are hired, based on background checks, dual-stage live video interviews, and skills assessments. Applicant accounts in Filipino job-seeker Facebook groups describe a multi-step process with waiting periods between stages rather than a single interview.

What’s the difference between MyOutDesk and OnlineJobs.ph?

MyOutDesk is a managed staffing company that recruits, vets, and places you with one client under its own payroll. OnlineJobs.ph is an open job-board marketplace where you build a profile and pitch Philippines-based employers directly, setting your own rate instead of working through a company-set pay split.

Keep Reading

• Belay Review: Pay, Requirements, and What It’s Actually Like to Work There
• Time Etc Review: Pay, Requirements, and What It’s Actually Like to Work There
• OnlineJobs.ph Review: Hiring a Filipino VA