Choosing an Adoption Professional: Is Your Adoption at Risk?

The adoption professional you choose could be the difference between a successful adoption – or a failed adoption.

With such an important decision, you should know: Is your professional exposing you to unnecessary risks?

The answer may surprise you. This guide breaks down potential changes in adoption law that could leave you scrambling to find a trusted, licensed professional.

A New, Serious Risk to Adoptive Families

In late 2024, the FTC sent out a letter with their concerns about facilitators and law centers. 31 facilitators received the FTC adoption warning, which specifically mentioned companies that provide marketing, advertising, or consulting services in connection with matching prospective adoptive parents with birth parents for private adoptions (“adoption intermediaries”) may be violating the FTC Act or the Consumer Review Fairness Act.

The FTC warns of additional actions as warranted, including up to $50,000 fines for additional infractions and the permanent closure of facilitators continuing unethical practices.

In addition to the FTC adoption warning, the federal government has been working to pass “The ADOPT Act,” which will require adoption professionals to be licensed in each state in which they provide related adoption services.  If/when passed, this will eliminate adoption consultant’s and facilitators’ ability to continue to offer adoption services, as unlicensed providers will have to abruptly shut-down.

If you are a family working with an unlicensed adoption service provider, you are at risk of not only a loss of time, money, and effort but also of a failed adoption and having to start the entire process over again.

Choosing an Adoption Professional: Why You Should Avoid Using an Adoption Facilitator

While the FTC adoption warning and ADOPT Act indicate changes in United States adoption laws are coming soon, the risks of working with a facilitator are nothing new.

Adoption facilitators are unlicensed and unregulated organizations or individuals. They offer adoption matching services, but cannot provide full-scale adoption services. This means an adoptive family will have to find other professionals for counseling, legal, and home study services, as well as any other necessary services throughout the adoption.

Because adoption facilitators are not regulated or reviewed, they tend to provide services that do not comply with state or federal adoption law, are known to give inaccurate wait time estimates and inflated placement totals, and, as the FTC warning mentions, suppress any negative reviews to portray themselves as more reputable.

Facilitators expose you to a higher risk of practices that are not being completed in a safe, legal, or ethical manner.  When you choose to work with an unlicensed provider, you are exposed to risks like:

• Disruption or failed adoptions
• Loss of time and money
• Being scammed
• And more

With something as important as becoming a parent, it is not worth the risk to work with an unlicensed facilitator or consultant.

What Type of Adoption Professional Should I Choose?

The answer to this question may seem like common sense, but you want to choose a trusted, licensed agency that will provide the highest level of service in a legal and ethical manner.

Licensed adoption agencies are federally regulated organizations that have the ability to provide all of the adoption services necessary to complete a successful, legal adoption. In order to maintain their licensing, agencies are monitored and reviewed to ensure their practices are legal and ethical, specific to the state laws in which they are providing adoption services. These services may include:

• Adoption education
• Counseling services
• Legal services
• Pre and post-placement support services
• Home study services
• And more

The best adoption agencies will also offer a financial protection program to protect hopeful adoptive families in the case of an adoption disruption.

Working with a reputable agency helps you avoid unnecessary risks throughout your adoption process. While facilitators and consultants may sound appealing, the risks outweigh the rewards, and finding a trusted, licensed agency is in your best interest.

Anytime you have questions about finding the right provider, risks of working with an adoption facilitator, or anything adoption related, you can always contact an adoption professional to get the answers you need.