LifeStance HealthReviews of lifestance.com

Horrible scheduling and patient portal

Lifestance health charges you 100.00 no show when your appointment isn't but 35.00 dollars to me that's a rip off and you can never get anyone in the Pooler Ga office period got to go somewhere else!!!!!!

My therapist is great and costs me about $50/hour after my insurance, my med provider is not stellar and costs over $200/hr after insurance. The company as a whole is your classic private equity, make money at the expense of anyone but those at the top. Also extremely predatory cancelation fees that actually incentivizes LifeStance to increase cancellation percentages of patients, At the expense of the patient and the clinician. I’ve had multiple issues resolved via customer service but I’ve only been ignored when trying to address the issues with fees and billing in general. Customer service is outsourced and in my experience, poor.

I’ve gone back and forth about writing this review, but after three years with this practice, I feel my experience is important to share. Dr. Harris is a wonderful psychiatrist. I have genuinely enjoyed every appointment and interaction I’ve had with him and have loved being his patient. He is the only reason I am leaving two stars rather than one. If I were reviewing Dr. Harris alone, I would give him five stars without hesitation. Unfortunately, I have decided to leave the practice because of repeated negative experiences with the front desk and administrative staff. It is extremely disappointing to lose a provider I trust because the administrative side of the practice has made the overall experience so frustrating. In my experience, interactions with the front desk have frequently felt dismissive, short-tempered, and disrespectful, even when asking simple questions. This is concerning in any healthcare setting, but especially in a mental health practice. Communication has also consistently been frustrating. I have spent very long periods on hold while being told staff were assisting other patients. During in-person visits, I have frequently seen very few people in the waiting room and staff away from the front desk. At one appointment, the desk was unattended for more than an hour, and I was eventually told to leave and that someone would contact me later for payment. These concerns were not new. In July, I submitted a formal complaint to corporate leadership regarding an interaction with administrative staff. I also referenced public reviews from other patients describing similar concerns because I wanted leadership to understand that my experience did not appear to be isolated. My final straw came in September. I had a follow-up appointment scheduled for September. In August, I decided I was doing well enough that I did not need it and wanted to avoid the approximately $300 expense, so I called on August 20 specifically to cancel. Because the practice charges a $100 late-cancellation fee, I intentionally canceled well in advance. During that call, I stated that I would contact the office when I was ready to schedule another appointment and did not want to schedule anything else at that time. On September 12, I received an email reminding me of an appointment scheduled for September 15. I called on September 14 and explained that I had canceled my previous follow-up and had not scheduled another appointment. I was told their notes showed that I had requested the September 15 appointment. I did not. The entire reason I canceled was because I was feeling mentally well, did not believe I needed an appointment, and wanted to avoid an unnecessary expense. Despite explaining that I had not requested the September 15 appointment, I was told that canceling it would result in a $100 cancellation fee. Being told that I requested an appointment I know I did not request—and then being told I would be financially responsible for canceling it—was the point at which I decided I could no longer continue with this practice. Mental health patients deserve administrative staff who communicate respectfully, maintain accurate records, and understand how consequential issues involving appointments, medication, referrals, billing, and unexpected fees can be. I sincerely hope the practice takes these concerns seriously and makes changes to ensure patients are treated with professionalism, compassion, and dignity. This is genuinely unfortunate because I think extremely highly of Dr. Harris and wish I could continue seeing him. However, after my repeated experiences with the administrative side of the practice, I no longer feel comfortable remaining a patient here. Despite having an excellent psychiatrist, I cannot recommend the practice as a whole.

When I called to make initial new patient appointment for both my husband and myself, I told them up front I needed a Dr, not a therapist. This was early in the year too, so I told them three times because of the deductible I had to make. They still set us up with a therapist and because we stayed for the appointment, and they had the Dr approve our meds, we were still charged. Ok, that's fine. Then I called to make a payment and found out we owed almost $1k. I asked to start a payment plan and make an initial payment of $100 on the total amount. They refused. Their portal doesn't always work either, so I could not get the payment assistance paperwork. They have to send it to me. One for each account. When we finally both got an appointment with the actual Dr, he was all about himself and was even screening us for "commitment" due to the fact that we both took medications that could be considered habit forming. I have never been treated so rudely in my LIFE. I will NEVER go back here nor will I send friends or family to this shit show. NOPE NOPE NOPE

First I would like to say that I am sure people have gotten help from Lifestance but not me. Second I was charged a no show fee of 100.00 even though I sent several messages saying I needed to cancel my appointment and reschedule. My appointment on a Monday I gave them notice the Tuesday the week before and never recieved a reply back. I know they got my messages because the message I sent to confirm the time they responded. I refuse to pay a no show fee for an appointment I canceled well ahead of time.

Though my therapist was great, lifestance itself is very problematic. Following their settlement for unlawfully violating my privacy and selling user data (lifestance pixel settlement), they've been sliding in brand new forms and contracts making it harder to sue them, and easier for them to sell your data, including protected health information, just prior to therapy or telehealth sessions. I had been a client of lifestance for several years, but today was the last day, the terms they tried to force in before I could see my therapist were just totally unacceptable.

Providers are fine but the schedulers are terrible at providing suggestions for appropriate therapists. Dealing with their admin overall is terrible. Billing department is absolute hell. I've had to call multiple times to remove fees that collections had already agreed to waive. All cancellations, reschedulings and new appointments cannot be done online and have to happen over the phone. Even updating basic patient information, like preferred name (super transphobic btw) and address, requires a phone call. Avoid if possible. There are better therapy network alternatives out there like Grow and others.