How we check providers

We check facts about every provider in a county, whether they pay us or not. We write down what we found and the date. We do not rate the therapy itself, because we have never seen it. Parents’ reviews sit in their own box, in their own words. Money never changes a check. Every provider can reply publicly.

Each check is marked Yes, No, or Could not check, with the date we looked.

• Credential current. The person in charge of the work holds the license or certification the work requires, and it is active today. We look it up on the official registry, not on the provider’s website.
• No discipline on record. The official registry shows no discipline, or we say what it shows.
• Regional Center vendor. The provider is approved to be paid by the Regional Center for this county, and for which service. If we could only confirm this from the provider, we say “provider-reported.”
• Takes Medi-Cal. Which Medi-Cal health plans the provider is in. “Provider-reported” unless we confirmed it in the plan’s own directory.
• Reachable. We called the way a parent would and recorded how many business days until a person called back. We do not record calls.
• Openings and wait. What they told us about openings and wait time, with the date. Providers with a paid profile can update this themselves, and the update is dated.
• Says the same thing everywhere. What they told us on the phone matches their website on ages served, areas served, and insurance taken. If not, we say where they differ.

• How good the therapy is. We cannot see sessions, and outcome data is not public. Anyone who claims to grade that for you is guessing.
• Anything we could not look up or test ourselves. If a check says “Could not check,” that is exactly what it means.

• Only a parent or guardian of a child the provider served may post. We ask them to confirm that.
• Reviews are never paid for, by us or by the provider. A provider may not offer anything for a review.
• We remove a review only if it threatens someone, names a child or shares private information, is not from a real client, or is about a different provider. When we remove one, we note that a review was removed and why.
• Reviews show their date. Old reviews stay up.
• A provider’s reply appears under the review, labeled as the provider’s.

• Every provider has a free page with every check above.
• A paid page adds photos, a longer description, a contact form, and an openings field the provider keeps current.
• A sponsored spot is labeled “Sponsored” on the page and in search results, and there are never more than three per county per category.
• Paying cannot change a check, remove a review, or move a provider above one that scored better on the same checks, except inside the labeled sponsored spots.
• We charge flat fees. We are never paid per family, per call, or per child who starts services.

If anything on a page is wrong, tell us at hello@answersforfamilies.com. We re-check within 5 business days. If we were wrong, we fix the page and note the correction. If we were right, we say what we found.