I'd guess that you have a questline open & only those not involved went.
The quest set that started on 21st Dec uses a lot of Springfielders, so that's probably it. Have a look through - the non-compliant characters should have a task in yellow at the top of their list.
You would've only been charged $ for the characters able to be assigned 24hr task. And the donut payout is there now 'cos you don't have any valid characters (without quest tasks) to send again, so it's only for finishing those on-task.