TalkspaceReviews of talkspace.com

I have an amazing psychiatrist. But I have been unable to find a therapist in my time zone. On three separate occasions, the therapist has been on the East Coast. I am PST, and the time difference does not work.

I continually will receive notifications from the app when there is nothing in the chat. This needs to be disabled by Talkspace as it is completely annoying and unnecessary.

Surprise bills from insurance suck. Advertisement says 100% covered by my insurance. Turns out I’m paying $179 per session. Same price for 30, 45, or 60 minute sessions.

Firstly, my therapist was fantastic and this is not a reflection of her in any way. Talkspace as a company was fine until a few months ago. The first issue I had was when I received an email with a bill for a session from almost 3 years earlier with little explanation and a stripe link to pay. Assuming it was spam I reached out directly to the company to check and they told me it was legit. It took a few weeks and a bunch of digging through my old papers to find proof that I had paid for the session at the time and I was finally able to get that sorted out. The second and final issue was last week. I was sent an email that my insurance was going to expire on 12/13, which is weird as my insurance changes on the 1st of the year. The email stated that I had to update my insurance info or my booked session for 12/11 (today) would be cancelled, so I updated the info (which wasn't changing) and I was immediately informed on the website that my therapist was no longer available, my appointment was cancelled and the room I messaged with her in was closed. So days before what could have been a wrap-up session if I had known, I was suddenly cut off from my therapist of 3 years. I was devastated. Honestly, I'm in an ok place and was dialing back on sessions, but to suddenly have it taken away with literally zero communication options is horrendous. I can't imagine if I were still struggling and this happened. I did reach out to Talkspace and asked about paying for a session out of pocket to have a final session, which they gave me directions about how to possibly set that up (the only reason I gave two stars instead of one), but honestly I'm done with them and don't need the headache of trying to set up a new room to do a single session or wish to give them any more of my money.

Me and my wife were having disagreements and so she started counseling with you all. After about 4-5 sessions, she began being really down all the time, and always having an issue with me. I asked her how can I fix myself, and she explained to me all the things I could do, so I started doing everything that was asked of me. After every session there was another issue for me to fix. This happened continuously for what felt like a month or two even though it could of been shorter. The last straw was accusing me of financial abuse, and emotional abuse. Not wanting to be married, and "putting love on the back burner. Focus on finding yourself" While we're married, and trying to fix our relationship. I explained myself to her and told her I was the sole provider for the family, and even though we're well off, we can't go out on 100$+ dates every night. Then our history of just starting a family, I didn't know what I was doing, I was worried and scared too, but I was trying. After multiple hour long conversations, she finally told me she was getting this from her counselor, and so I said no more, and told her to cancel her appointments. Since cancelling the appointments, she's been happy, feeling beautiful and useful, and understanding. She is accepting that she is a mother and wife, and has been glowing. Treating me way better and we finally went to bed without a fight, without hours long conversation and it's been so peaceful. I'm sure down the road issues will come up, but for now my house is back to normal with a few pluses gained from the counselor. In the counselors defense, I did do things wrong, and did make several mistakes in our relationship. I'm happy those things were brought to light and I'm finally able to be the man my wife deserves. Also, because of the counselor, my wife has been taking a lot better care of herself and has developed a healthy routine taking care of her weight, and pysrosis. But I truly do think, a counselors goal shouldn't be to tear a marriage apart, but to help build it back up when we were in a rough spot.

The sessions are only for 45 minutes NOT 60 minutes (which I didn't know - if I new this I probable would have tried a different route) but the virtual visits will automatically cut off 43-44 minutes. Most of the time the sessions just ended abruptly. The therapist did not show up for one of the scheduled virtual appointments - I waited for 15 minutes, therapist did not come on. Texted the therapist and did not hear back. Heard back 3 days later. Therapist was sick - however, nothing notified me that the virtual visit was cancelled. I thought with 2 out of 6 sessions that I had left, I was not about to find a new therapist and start over with only just 2 sessions left. I called customer service to see what happened to my therapist (this was before I heard back from her), the customer service representative was very rude and short with me at first until I said - what if I was suicidal? The therapist not showing up is not a good thing. What if I had serious mental health issues? After I said this was only when the customer service rep became became nicer. More training is needed in this area for customer service representatives - especially this being a behavioral health representative. The reason why I gave talkspace a 2 star was because it was quick and easy to schedule a therapist. You just pick the date and time that you want, however, it does not give you an option to choose the type of therapist that you want or even screen them to see what their specialties are. So it does limit you to the type of therapist you desire. I felt like mine needed more experience - the quality of her skills just is not there yet.

My therapist’s style was not good for me. I need a therapist who offers more interaction and interventions.

I connected fairly quickly with a good therapist. No complaints there. In the past I've used BetterHelp and BetterUp with no serious billing issues, but the billing system for Talkspace is really screwed up. You basically have to pay ahead a month at a time and try to plan all of your appointments work for the coming month. I was slow on the first month, and paid almost $400.00 for one half-hour video session and three text messaging exchanges. Will do slightly better in September, but I've cancelled after that. This system is way too complicated, and I'm really angry, having spent around $800.00 over 2 months for 3 or 4 half-hour video sessions and some texting... No online therapist (or even psychiatrist) is worth $200 for 30 minutes!! Let the buyer beware with Talkspace...