BetterHelpReviews of betterhelp.com

Good resources available here! Just not very clear on how payment works for somebody new. Causes issues with my therapist and finances

There are some benefits to this platform because it simplifies the tedious process of booking appointments but ultimately it serves therapists more than clients by offering an unmanageable number of therapists it is hard to differentiate between, most of whom have only the most basic professional qualifications. The first therapist I matched met with lacked expertise and claimed to believe in dragons and fairies. The second doesn’t offer video calls and immediately suggested I look elsewhere if this was a problem. While I understand the move to digital and offering different ways of talking it’s odd for therapists to refuse more personal interactions as surely that’s the point of therapy? It’s resulting in the same tiring and bewildering experience as you find on the internet. A major downside is that many therapist outside of Better Help will offer a short consultation for free whereas you don’t get that here. It means you can very easily burn through your monthly subscription fee without having a single useful conversation (e.g the hour I spent with the dragon/fairy lady). The problem is a profession which should have better standards and be better regulated (the existing qualifications are not good enough) BetterHelp should help users sort through quality rather than just providing quantity.

I think BetterHelp can be an extremely beneficial service, given you connect with the right therapist. It took over a year of me just on BetterHelp to find a therapist I liked and trusted. I suppose, like any other medium of therapy, it takes a few tries to find the right match for your treatment. Overall, I find the scheduling and journaling features to be efficient and effective in my treatment.

I like that it's easy to use and quick to find a therapist. Dislike that they don't take insurance and don't offer hour long sessions

I have enjoyed the app so far. I think my one issue is I'm having trouble writing in the journal. I can see what the prompt is, but I cannot figure out how to type in the journal itself. So, i take the journal prompt and write it in my personal journal. I emailed customer service, but have not heard back and it's been about a week. I would make that portion of it more user friendly. Otherwise, I think the whole thing is pretty great.

Two sessions in and the thing I have noticed is that I have received nothing at all but a headache. They give you 7 minutes to create and activate your session, or you're considered to be late and a no-show. Remember, if you need to give permissions to their app which is DIFFERENT THAN EVERY OTHER APP, then you need to leave the app and thereby a NO-SHOW. Your counselor cannot restart the meeting or let you in after that 7 minutes. You're just SOL. I contacted their help desk with this issue and have heard a whole lot of nothing. They demand you pay for 4 sessions but I'm 2 in and just want my money back. Because if I wanted a computer to call me, then I'd skip the $340 they demand to do a whole lot of nothing. Let's see, for the pychologist themselves. I told them I have some depression but mostly anxiety. Yet I STILL get daily things of, 'how are you dealing with your mindblowing amounts of depression?' Lol. I need that depression to keep my anxiety from bouncing me off the bloody wall. Do not touch the barely working pillar of my terrible personality love. That's how. They do not care how you feel. They just want to scalp you for money. Update: While it took a WHILE to do so, they did finally reimburse me the money I paid for the first month. So I will rerate them a 3. Maybe others can get help from this site but I think they need to change how the therapy session works because if you only have 7 minutes to fix your computer to work with their site, you're going to miss a LOT of therapy sessions just due to BS.

The only dislike I have is that at least half or alittle more time of my sessions. Have had some Interruptions with the video signal and sometimes the phone signal cutting off on me and my therapist. I don't know if my therapist have said anything to Better Help about it, and I hoped that I would have had some type if credit to my account for these mishap. Due to it being out of my control, and out of my Therapist control. Besides that, it's been great experience with Better Help.

I had one terrible therapist (Maria Arana) who asked me for a summary of what I was looking for (childhood trauma help), scheduled me, wasted 15 min complaining to me about her Covid (that mine was her 1st session back & that she may have to end it early), and then told me she does *not* think we’re compatible because she doesn’t “do childhood trauma”, then wanted to waste more of my time to explain BetterHelp? Why did she take my appointment? I was in a non-emergency crisis at the time and really needed someone to talk to. My guess just to get paid. I told BetterHelp and they refunded me, but Maria is still in BetterHelp *and* their marriage counseling app??? She should have been removed. Customer Service is AWFUL! I contacted them no less than 5 times in the last month to confirm my account/billing has been paused for a month. I’ve received the “well get back to you in 24 hrs” response each time without ever actually getting back to me with a response. I’ve contacted them on Instagram messaging, and CALLED 2 days ago (I found the elusive phone number on a bill receipt in the app), spoke to someone who said they can’t access accounts but (at my request) would have someone *call tomorrow* and never received that call or an email w my answer. So I’m canceling my account so I’m not billed this month. I gave the app 3 stars because I *did* find a very good therapist (Melanie), who has always been-there for me via messages and sessions and is a professional. I do appreciate the ability to message my therapist as need arises. It’s too bad the “back office” is so awful.