Skip to Content

Results of Top Three Au Pair Agency Picks Survey

By Bella Gioia, Research & Evaluation Director

In January of this year, we published our Top Three Au Pair Agency Picks for 2009.  Six months later we are re-evaluating our choices.  A key component of our re-evaluation is our Customer Satisfaction Survey.  Below is a brief summary of our survey results:

Rate Your Agency's Overall Customer Service - this section of the survey asked host parents to rate their au pair agency's overall customer service:

Au Pair Care (aupaircare.com)

The majority (70%) of Au Pair Care host parents rate their Customer Service as Excellent. 

Written comments are very favorable and reflect strong customer support. 

Examples: "My questions are answered in a timely and professional manner. I feel like AuPairCare supports the host family and the au pair," "Amazing service! My area director really cares about the success of our family," "We investigated all 3 in December and found a big difference between Au Pair Care's customer service and the other 2 - and I'm not exaggerating!"

Au Pair in America (aupairinamerica.com)

Although 46% of Au Pair in America host families rate their Customer Service as Excellent, 27% of families rate the service they received as Poor.  Written comments are sparse but favorable.  Examples: "very responsive via email," "Our counselor is outstanding and the office in Stamford has always be very responsive," "...a little extra money, but well worth it.  My family could not be happier."

Cultural Care (culturalcare.com)

Cultural Care has the highest percentage of negative ratings ("Fair - Poor"). They also have the most negative written comments.

The comments reflect host parents' frustrations with the following areas:

1. Poorly Screened Au Pairs: (ex., "They allow by policy, au pairs to use family and friends as references. They rated our au pair as a 7 out of 7 {the best} for written and spoken English but she was unable to understand anything except hand signals")

2. Poor Customer Service Once a Match was Completed: (ex., "Cultural Care is Very aggressive 'selling' an au pair to you, but after you pay the ENTIRE fee up front, their customer support disappears. When you need help or have fairly serious problems with your au pair, the LCC and Home offices of Cultural care are extremely slow to respond. VERY Poor customer service")

3. Difficulty Getting Refunds: (ex., "After having a poor experience with my au pair, the hassle it took to get my refund has made me swear I will never host a cultural care au pair again")

4. Staff Turnover: (ex., "Their staff turnover is endless. It is so sad;" "We had a revolving door of LCCs in the 5 months we participate with Cultural Care. Our last LCC told us she quit after working with CC for 2 months because it "felt so dirty working with this agency because they constantly recycle dangerous au pairs to family after family")

 



Theme by Dr. Radut.