Tired of debt stress keeping you up at night?

No. Working with a credit counsellor does not affect your credit score in any way. It’s a completely private, confidential conversation and is never reported to your creditors, your credit report, or anyone else. No one will ever know unless you tell them.

The simple answer to these questions is No. You do not have to tell your creditors that you have spoken with us. This is a free country. You can speak with anyone you like, and speaking with us is completely private and confidential.

Your creditors will only find out that you’ve spoken to us if you tell them. There is no other way they can find out. You are under no obligation to tell your creditors who you’ve been speaking to. However, if your creditors know you’ve been struggling to pay your bills and are anxious to hear what your plans are to repay them, then they may actually be happy to hear that you are speaking to us because this typically means that you are now proactively taking action to address your situation and will likely soon have a plan to move forward.

If you are concerned about how to speak with your creditors, ask one of our credit counsellors as part of your conversation with them. They will coach you on the best way to deal with your situation.

Beyond simply speaking with us and having an appointment with a credit counsellor to review your options, you may decide to enter into a repayment program and become a longer-term client. Even then, your partner doesn’t need to know that you are repaying your debts with our help if you don’t tell them. While their support can be invaluable, we leave it up to you to tell them if you’d like to.

If you’re not sure how to tell your partner about your debts, feel free to ask them to join you for your appointment with one of our credit counsellors. While they might be surprised by what you owe, looking at options to address your debt at the same time can potentially ease the surprise.

The appointments we offer with our credit counsellors are completely free. Calling us and speaking with any of our staff members is also free. For 95% of the people we help, we do so without charging even a penny. We have no hidden fees. The only time we charge for our service is when someone decides to go onto one of our debt relief programs. However, the costs for these programs is fully disclosed up-front and is very low.

We’ve helped over 1 million Canadians since 1996. Our perspective is that between financial difficulty and bankruptcy there are a large range of options. We specialize in helping people explore these options. No matter how bad your situation is, our credit counsellors have probably seen much worse, but even if your situation was the worst, that wouldn’t matter because our approach is to always be non-judgmental and keep things 100% confidential. We’re here to help you explore your options and come up with a realistic plan to resolve your financial problems. Our counsellors typically do such a good job helping people that over 60% say they sleep better the very first night after speaking with one of our credit counsellors.

What happens in a credit counselling session depends on what kind of an organization you are dealing with. If you’re dealing with a for-profit agency, the goal is often to help you by getting you to sign up for one of the programs that pays the credit counsellor or their employer. If you’re dealing with a quality non-profit credit counselling agency such as a member of Credit Counselling Canada, they will typically spend close to an hour with you listening to you, finding out what your financial challenges are, finding out what your financial goals are, and the begin the solution process by first helping you put together a realistic budget. With your input, they will construct a budget for you from which you can then begin having a conversation about options that may work for you. The credit counsellor will then help you explore all options that could potentially address your situation. They’ll discuss the pros and cons with you with an eye towards finding something that will help you accomplish your financial goals, get you out of debt within a reasonable time period, and work within your budget.

Quality credit counsellors are budgeting experts. As part of the process they will likely help you find ways to optimize your budget and get the most out of it.

By the end of the first session, most people will have a good idea of what their next steps are. They will essentially leave the appointment with an action plan of how to begin resolving their situation. If a second session is needed, this can be scheduled as well (and is also free of charge). The counsellor can then resume your previous conversation and hear how you’ve progressed with your first steps.

If you decide that a Debt Management Program offered by the credit counselling organization is your best solution, a quality non-profit will never allow you to sign-up that day. They will always insist that you go home, sleep on it, and discuss it with anyone whose advice you value. A quality decision should not be made on the spot and should always be carefully considered.

If you end up deciding that a consumer proposal or bankruptcy is your best option, then the credit counsellor will refer you to a Licensed Insolvency Trustee that they trust. They may even provide you with a number of names for you to choose from.

Whether you simply came here looking for credit counselling near me or want more structured financial guidance, these sessions are designed to give you a clear picture of your situation and a path forward.

Yes, the Credit Counselling Society (CCS) is a legitimate and highly respected non-profit organization that’s been helping Canadians manage their money and debt for nearly 30 years.

At one time, many provincial governments offered their own credit counselling services. But over time, they found that non-profit organizations like ours were able to provide better service at a lower cost—without relying on government funding. As a result, most provinces now refer people to trusted non-profits like us instead.

In fact, many of our clients are referred to us by government departments and agencies from across the country. Some government organizations even use our educational resources and invite us to provide financial literacy training for their staff.

Over the years, we’ve helped over a million Canadians one-on-one—and have reached millions more through our websites. We have more offices than any other non-profit credit counselling organization in Canada, and our team is frequently featured in the news offering expert advice and insights on financial issues that impact Canadians.

We also contribute weekly and bi-weekly articles to two major Canadian publications, The Province and the Financial Post, which are often re-published by media outlets nationwide.

Our work has earned us more than 80 awards at the regional, national, and international levels. We’ve also received over 1,500 online reviews on Google, Yelp, and Facebook—with an average rating of 4.9 out of 5 stars. Every year, we survey more than 10,000 of our clients, and for many years, over 98% have said they would recommend our service to others.

Education is at the heart of what we do. We have a dedicated team of full-time educators across Canada, and our outreach efforts have been recognized with multiple EIFLE Awards (Excellence in Financial Literacy Education) from the Institute for Financial Literacy.

We’re proud to be known as a great place to work. CCS has been named one of Canada’s 50 Best Workplaces multiple times and has been recognized for its commitment to women, millennials, fairness, giving back, and inclusion by Great Place to Work Canada®.

When it comes to trust and accountability, we go the extra mile:

• We’re overseen by a volunteer board of directors made up of financial and professional experts from across Canada.
• Our finances are independently audited every year by an external accounting firm—something no other credit counselling organization in Canada does.
• We maintain our registered non-profit status with the Government of Canada.
• We’re accredited by the Better Business Bureau (BBB) and Credit Counselling Canada (CCC), our industry’s national association with the highest standards of transparency and accountability.
• We were also the first international affiliate of the National Foundation for Credit Counseling (NFCC)—North America’s largest and most trusted non-profit credit counselling organization.

Finally, we don’t believe commission based compensation is the best way to serve those who look to us for help. Unlike many organizations out there, our staff are never paid commission of any kind. This ensures that every client receives unbiased, objective advice that’s truly in their best interest.