CareOne Credit Counseling

After reading many different reviews, positive and negative but mostly negative, I felt the need to write a review. I have been with Care One since July of 2012. I had roughly $10K+ of debt. I had reached a point where I was getting nowhere with making the minimum payments through all my creditors, being that I maxed out credit cards and had high interest rates due to having little credit to no credit history. I was young and irresponsible, using money that was truly not mine to spend. I couldn't afford to make higher payments to all my creditors and it seemed that with the payments I made, the interest would overcome my payments every month.

Believed that I was paying my debit off. Estimated I only had 6 months to pay it off. Ran credit report found out that it was more than the six payments but delinquent. According to cash call my balance was twice what I owed. Paid it off. Went to check my program report, couldn't access my emails to the program after I paid off debit to cash call. The other creditors that I had paid off had a check mark by them. Cash call was no longer listed as though it had never been a creditor. Program doesn't keep up with current balances. Beware. I ended up paying more than 100 percent of the loan because of this. Took out $2600.00 ended up paying $4500.00 for ten months.

I hired them to consolidate my debt and signed on for the 4 years and it's been 5... and now I am canceling. They have been charging me $12.00 a month the whole time. I'm hoping that is better than the interest!

Should have went through a Non-Profit, but otherwise they were fine.

Whatever you do don't use this company, this is the biggest rip off ever. Tell your neighbors, tell your friends not to use these people. All they want is your money. They make all kinds of promises, and pretend to be your best friend but all the time scheming to take your money. I will do whatever it takes to let everyone know what a rip off this company is. They even have the nerve to tell you MONEY BACK GUARANTEE! WHAT A BUNCH OF LIARS! Stay as far away from this company, I pray everyone who was scammed by this company will post their bad experience. Hopefully BBB will close these rip offs down, again let everyone know. Don't let your friends and family get ripped off of their hard-earned money!

They were great at first. I have had an account with them for 2 years and loved their work. It didn't get bad until they made it very hard to pay off the bill we owed the creditors. My loan manager said they were rude and they were quite rude to me too. We needed an accurate amount for pay off and it took them almost a month to get back to us. Now we finally got a hold of them again and they still couldn't get the amount we needed so we had to go ahead and pay off two creditors on our own and then pay the rest. We still do not know if it is totally paid off. We may have to pay more in January. If CareOne wanted us to pay off our bills fast they should have helped us more with paying it off. Instead I had to go to a loan officer and have help from her. Very unprofessional in my opinion.

If anyone out there is reading this, I got ripped off by CareOne. I was with them almost three years and was on my last payment according to them and when I called my creditor to get the balance, they said I still owed them 5700 dollars and I said, "That's crazy, it should be 274.95 dollars." That's when they told me they are not a settlement company and did not accept CareOne's proposal. Here's where it gets weird. CareOne has sent proposals to my creditor in the past for other CareOne members like myself and they're all handled the same, not accepted. That means no relief. I mean nothing, I did not get any interest charges dropped, no penalties dropped.

In late 2009, I knew that the museum I had worked for over the previous decade was going to close. I just didn't know how much time I had. We had some credit card debt, about $18,000 worth. I went on a recommendation from a family member with Care One (CESI). I'm puzzled by the other reviews I see here because we had zero problems in using their service, aside from one creditor (Barclay's) who refused to accept the negotiated payment arrangement. We figured that out... Just had Care One pay Barclay's the few dollars more they wanted. Every month, like clockwork, I make my payment, and every month, my creditors have been paid on time. I'm about 7 months from clearing out all that debt, and I've been saving easily over $100 per month in the difference I'd be paying in the non-negotiated creditor interest vs. my service fees to Care One, which are quite small for what they do. Their online account management is great, showing you how much is left due to each creditor, and how long until everything's paid off. Experiences when calling them have been great. They're responsive, helpful and courteous. I recommend this company highly.

I joined Care One about three months ago, after having a bad experience with a settlement company. At first, I was relieved that a place that seemed very well rated online was going to take care of my debts, credit cards and payday loans as well. I originally got into debt with credit cards and payday loans due to my job as a speech therapist working for a program in the state of Illinois. They started in 2008 to delay payments, whereas prior to this, they paid us every week. Delays went as much as eighty days at one time. One way therapists got by was to obtain credit cards, etc to help get by during these times. I already had one bankruptcy in my past due to Discover card putting a judgment against me. I have tried to deal with creditors as much as possible since this time to avoid having this happen again. Well, Capital One also decided to send me to a lawyer, bypassing the collections route that most credit cards take, even though I had made attempts to pay them before they did this.

I have been with them for about a year now - they gave me 2 options and were very clear about the pros and cons/consequences of each: one would lower my debt much faster but would have greater hardship on my credit scores (just a step above bankruptcy) and the other would require much more work on my part, but with their help we could get back on top. I chose the latter, and each month we crawl out together. Their reporting is impeccable and their attention to customers is without complaint. What more could you ask for... Miracles? Not likely. But this is a good, reliable company that delivers what they say. If anyone is disappointed, it is probably because they didn't ask enough questions up front, didn't read all the stuff they send you carefully, and had an overall case of "wishful thinking". There are no "magic wands" to make debt go away without consequences - that is childish to hope for!

When I contacted CareOne, the Rep explained to me the different choices I had with their programs to help me pay my debts with one small monthly payment. They told me that they had two services: a) credit card management counseling services and b) debt negotiation. I chose A which was to repay the entire debt, along with accrued interests, over the course of five years. The rep clearly explained to me that by choosing the debt management program, I was still paying 100% of the debts - but with lower monthly payments, she clearly told me that this program WOULD NOT impact my credit cards, nor my FICO score, and so I submitted the application under that condition.

I started the program back in April 2012. I had a lot of debt and they recommended Debt Settlement. Well, two of my creditors "accepted" the proposal (and are now paid). I currently have a large bill that is in settlement (which I'm happy that they've "accepted" the proposal at about 40% of the total amount). BUT last week, I was served FOUR summons from GE Capital Retail Bank. NOW, I have to go to court and CareOne is basically telling me, "You were to read the documents that we submitted to you from the beginning that you SIGNED." So instead of "possibly" going to court, they've resubmitted these four proposal offers to the Attorney of the Plaintiff. Well sure, they're willing to "accept" the proposals now but they've tacked on almost $4,000 IN FEES AND BACK PAYMENT. I'm no better off now than I was in the beginning. So, I should probably go to court next week and tell the judge that I was screwed over by CareOne and now I'm back peddling once again because of them.

I signed up with Care One after I lost my job so I would not screw up my credit. Six months later, I went to check my credit score and every payment has been late for the past 6 months. My score is now in the crapper because of them. I recommend trying to figure out an alternative but do not use these jerks.

I would give zero stars if possible. First off, they tell you not to pay your creditors directly so you get behind and then have a past 30-day payment on your credit history. The debt consolidation itself is a step above bankruptcy. The customer service is awful. Requests are not fulfilled and they charge $35 a month to give a meager discounted interest rate, and the late fees disappear after your credit is ruined! They do not communicate effectively and have done nothing but make my credit situation worse. Use the $35 fee towards your monthly bill because you will not get anywhere with this company!

CareOne mistreated us and was not a good partner in debt.

I must preface by saying that I take full responsibility for racking up $60,000 in credit card debt. The signs of impending financial disaster were there but I was in denial. My credit rating was excellent but it was becoming increasingly difficult to pay all the bills on time. The day I woke up to the truth, I called CareOne for help. I must admit that they were upfront in saying that my credit rating may be adversely affected by signing on, but I was desperate. They told me not to make any more payments to those creditors that I wanted to negotiate with. It was supposed to give me some kind of leverage. The longer my creditors didn't get a payment from me, the more they would be inclined to reduce my debt. Ha ha! They claimed to be able to reduce the amount I owed each company by about 25-40%. They said that I could negotiate on my own but would not get my total debt lowered as much if I worked with them on my own.

This post is going to be slightly different than the other 20 or so I've read in the last 10-15 minutes. I'm writing to defend CareOne Debt Relief Services, as 80% of what I have read so far is clearly false. The name "CareOne" is used by several (hundreds) of companies, all types of different industries; and there are some posts on here that are so falsely misleading. I took the time out of my extremely busy schedule in an effort to set the record straight. There are enough legitimately bad businesses out there, especially in the debt relief industry; the last thing any company needs is bad reviews about experiences a consumer has had with a totally different company.

We went to Care One for help with our debt situation in hopes we could pay our debts in a method which would allow us lower payments and still pay our creditors. Care One explained their method which is to contact the credit company and negotiate a payoff. Then our monthly fee to them would help pay the credit company until the debt was paid off. After almost two years into the program, we received a summons to appear in court for garnishment of wages. We called Care One who informed us that some creditors will do this and they would take care of it. We asked if we should go to the scheduled court date but they informed us not to. They would take care of it. Two months later, a garnishment on my wages began. When we called Care One, we had to leave messages for our reps. They, however, never returned our calls.

I entered the debt management program at CareOne for the express purpose of lowering my interest rate and consolidating my payments. My cards were not late, my credit is in good standing. CareOne didn't send my payment in a timely manner to my Citi accounts and after 3 months of "re-negotiating", Citi has now dropped those accounts from my consolidation, leaving me with late fees, a penalty 29% interest and late payments. Citi will not allow me to enter into another plan or agreement either.

So far I’m doing 90% of the work. If this continues, I will not be with them much longer .11 creditors approved, one more to go. I’m looking for a better option. A lawyer said for a grand he can clean up all my debts legally! I’m hopping the government shuts them down.

My husband called CareOne to get information on their program. When I found out, I told him and the company that I was not interested because of the cost and I did not want our credit score to be affected. Since this time, they have called at least five times. When they called this morning (12-7-2011), I told them I was the one in charge of finances and I was not interested in their program. I was told I "was not *** and that he would call back." He then hung up on me. When my husband called back and asked them not to call again, he was called an ***! I would not do business with this company now or in the future!

I came to CareOne credit with about $10,000 of debt. I spoke with a consultant regarding DMP at length before I enrolled in the plan because I had heard that these programs could negatively affect your credit history (My credit was excellent, but I was out of work and only able to pay the minimum balance at a very high interest rate). CareOne helped to lower my interest rates so that my payments were, in fact, lowering the amount I owed. However, the representative swore (on a recorded phone call) that the DMP would absolutely have no effect on my credit rating. I pulled my credit report recently, and saw negative marks on my credit report. I called CareOne to report that their employee had provided fraudulent information in order to get me to enroll in the program. The manager apologized and said there was nothing they could do about this. The employee was not even reprimanded.

CareOne Credit Counseling of Cherry Hill, NJ is out of business. We paid $1,000 per month that was supposed to be accumulated to anticipate a payoff from our creditors. $4,000, later we learned that they were out of business and took all of our money without providing one bit of service that we paid for. They didn't tell us anything. Phones disconnected, office packed up, the employees and owners all moved away. We cannot find them to even try and get out money back.

What a bunch of ** this company is! They do what they want and without your best interest. They take $50 a month as a fee. And then they take a fee for whatever money they supposedly save you, which for me amounted to about $200. For over the year that I was with this company they took over $1000 in fees. They settled with a few creditors, but I could have done that myself without their help or their fees. I specifically told them not to settle on any accounts without first letting me know. They said they wouldn't negotiate and settle without first talking to me. But instead they just did what they wanted and took the fees without any correspondence on what they took or paid. Please do not waste your time working with this company. There has to be better debt consolidation companies out there!

I signed up for the Debt Management Program (DMP) a year and a half ago in Arizona. I had five or six creditors that accepted me into the program, and everything was going very well. I moved to California, and I called CareOne to change my mailing address. They told me that there was a different program in California, and that I'd have sign a new agreement to continue.

We made our monthly payments to CareOne as agreed. One year later we find that CareOne has passed our account to some law firm without telling us. None of our bills had been paid even once during that year. When we complained, we were told there was nothing they could do and our only recourse was to discontinue the service. When we did, the law firm kept 2/3s of the money we'd paid over the year for "expenses."

I signed up with Care One Credit Services (CESI) in March 2011. This company is bogus. Citibank accepted the proposal sent for monthly payments of $77. CESI neglected to send the payment to Citibank in a timely fashion as Citibank dropped me from their debt management program. CESI pretty much has told me that there was nothing that they could do. When I called customer service, the service representatives have been unprofessional. I have been hung up on and also told to cancel my services if I am unsatisfied. They have no intention of rectifying their error. Because of this, it doesn't appear that Citibank will accept me into their debt management program.

My husband and I are enrolled in CareOne's debit settlement program. January of this year, I received a call from the lawyer of CareOne, Stan ***, saying that he had settled an account and agreed to make monthly payments of $100 but that I needed to pay an extra $200 over the $300 monthly payment to pay this account on time. I did so. I received another call from Mr. *** about a week or so later telling me that CareOne had used the money that was supposed to be paid on the account to settle another account. He also said he spoke to the lawyers for the creditor and they agreed to a partial payment in February and a full payment in March but that I was again short because of the money being used on that other account. Mr. *** said I needed to come up with another $27 on Feb. 27th. I paid another $27. The payment was never made. CareOne said I didn't get it in on time. As a result of this, my husband's check is being garnished.

I joined CareOne in May 2010 and everything seems to go okay until in November, they took out 2 payments within 4 days of each other. I had my bank cancelled the 2nd erroneous payment since when I contacted CareOne, they said it would take 14 days to reimburse me for the error. The agent also stated that all my bank fees would be reimbursed. This was in December 2. Now, it is December 14 and I get a letter in the mail basically stating they will not reimburse me for the bank charges.

I am not leery of Care One Credit. Before I started with Care One Credit, I had heard of Consumer Credit Counseling of Rochester, New York, but I chose to go with Care One Credit. So far, things are going okay; my bills are going to the creditors because I double-check.