Complain about a product or service

Debt Management Credit Counseling Corp.

Margaret of St. Paul MN (1/4/03):
My husband and I fell behind on a couple of our credit cards about 30 days. We had 8 credit cards and I just couldn't keep up on them all so I signed up with DMCC to help lower the interest and have to pay only one payment. This was December 2001. By April 2002 all of my cards were delinquent and over limit and late fees mounting. Not only was I receiving additional charges, the interest rate wasn't dropped on a majority of the cards.

I began calling DMCC to try to get it resolved. They dragged their feet for months and finally in October the interest rate was dropped. When I asked about all of the extra interest I'd paid and the late fees, etc... they were going to get back to me. Never heard from them. I then received notice that 3 of our cards were sold to a new company in October. Called DMCC so that they could get everything taken care of. The last two statements have indicated that the interest rates are all back up, late fees mounting, overlimit fees added.

This month - no payment was received by two of the cards so I called to pay them myself. DMCC still has not returned my calls regarding the reimbursement and getting everything fixed. Today I filed a complaint with the BBB, but I don't know how far that will get me - I did not document the exact dates of all my phone calls with DMCC, which the BBB wants. I have also emailed their executive director to let her know just how dissatisfied I am and that I do not want them handling any of my accounts. I will contact all of my creditors myself.

This has been a nightmare that now has my accounts severely delinquent and over their limits. My credit score has plummeted and is going to take me at least a year to fix. My suggestion to everyone is contact your creditors yourself. You can accomplish as much with them as the debt counselors and will have much more control over it. I have requested that they give me back the money I sent them to start this "nightmare" and hope that they will, though my guess is that they'll respond as promptly as before - NEVER TO BE HEARD FROM AGAIN.

Nathan of Doylestown PA (6/30/03):
I am sure you have heard the same story about them as you will get here. Had agreed to consolidate nearly $30,000 in debt with them and they calculated a monthly payment for me, $700-800. They required that I give them 2x that amount to get started and after I did, my monthly payment went up because they could not negotiate with 90% of the creditors I had enrolled with them through.

I withdrew from their service after them making late payments to all my creditors even though I paid DMCC on time. In all, i was forced to file bankruptcy and DMCC sent me a letter that they would send me $50 if I would sign a closure agreement. yeah right. I signed no such document because I think they should give me tha $1500 I gave them initially for nothing.

I filed bankruptcy, had to move, etc. etc. etc.

Geni of Friedens PA (5/1/03):
I am a customer of Debt Management Credit Counseling Corp. I consolidated some credit card debt with them. They promised that within 3.5 years I would be finished paying and my credit would be wiped clean of these debts. As of this month I have made 50 monthly payments. Last August (2001) I had a review of my accounts done and they said I had approximately 24 more months to pay! That would mean it will take 5.5 years instead of the 3.5 years originally stated when I started the payments.

If they would have stuck to the original 3.5 years, I would have been finished with my payments about 6 months ago! Instead I have about 16 more monthly payments to make. Emotionally, I have had problems getting credit for certain things because when banks see that we are in their program that throws out a red flag to them. I thought that their program would help us and be better than bankruptcy, but instead I have struggled with banks and lenders over this.

Brian of Sterling Heights MI writes (2/7/01):
I was contacted by debt management to consolidate some credit card debt. I gave them the names of my creditors. I had two cards that I was interested in consolidating, a First USA and an Associates.

They told me that all I had to do was send a check and everything would be taken care of. The amount was $450.00. Upon further inspection I told them that I did not want them to handle the Associates account. Somehow they did contact Associates and my card was cancelled and due to that my interest rate went from 12.99% to 15.99%. They claim they never contacted them but Associates told me they have them on record. But Debt Management is not lisenced to do business in Michigan.

I told Debt Management I did not want to deal with them and they offered to give me half of my money that I sent them. I contacted First USA and told them not to deal with Debt Management ever. Realizing that I had made a mistake I settled to get half of my money back. Debt Management then refused to pay anything back based on all the work that they had done.

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