Financial health of agencies?

nancyandnate

We've just started looking at adoption more seriously and have some appointments to meet with them in the next few weeks. ?Yesterday I was reading a newsletter from one of the agencies that said 75% of agencies dealing with international adoption are expected be out of business in the next year. ?(It was at www.ftia.org) ?Is there any way to check the financial health of agencies? ?Any kind of independent organization that reviews and rates them like there is for businesses?

TIA!?

jacksjerseygirl

I'm not adopting internationally but I have two cents

1. Did the article from the agency also state what the financial stability of THEIR agency was? If so, this might be a clue that they are trying to sell themselves and might exaggerate to make themselves look like the best agency to go with,

2. 75% seems very high to me for them to just go out of business within year. I'm not saying it couldn't happen because with the economy people may put off their adoption plans which may force agencies to reduce services, reduce client load, or close all together.

3. I suppose you could ask for the agencies annual financial reports, you might just start making calls to the BBB or even to an attorney or CPA who might be able to help you find this out. I'm going to guess there may not be a third party that does the reviews but the agency themselves may have to provide to you upon request some sort of annual report or financial review

Good luck!

nancyandnate

Thanks for the input. ?It was actually something I was thinking about before reading the stat, so that just confirmed that there are concerns within the community. ?I agree the figure is probably overstated. ?

My dad is a cpa, so I'm going to ask for his input once we are ready to "go public" with this info. ?He'll tell us to use Lutheran Social Services though, since that is where they got me. ?I want to make an objective decision on what is right for us before getting their opinion.?

I'll let folks know what I find out!?