Steer clear of Debtline for debt counseling

I entered into Debtline's debt counseling services in February 2019. Their customer service was excellent in obtaining me as a new client, and everything went smoothly for the first few months. Unfortunately, after coming on board, there was absolutely zero customer support. I've struggled on several occasions to get a response from them via email or WhatsApp when sending general queries or requesting documentation - they completely ignore your correspondence unless you make contact telephonically which isn't much better as their inbound phone lines are terrible and you cannot hear a word that the person on the other side is saying. I never received my policy documents and never got answers to any of my questions or concerns.

To top this, earlier in this year they failed to pay my creditors as per the agreement without my prior knowledge or consent. They deducted my monthly agreed upon debit order and only after receiving missed payment notifications from my creditors and painstaking inquiries and follow ups with them did they offer the explanation that they hadn't paid due to the financial position that lockdown had put THEM in affecting MY credit score. In fact, for ten months out of the fifteen months I was under debt review they failed to send one of my creditors payment updates and in turn caused missed payments to reflect on my credit report. This I also found out by accident while reviewing my credit score after taking over my own debt repayments again. I tried inquiring about this situation via email, but true to their usual form I got no response. I also never received a remittance showing that they had indeed paid my creditors with the last installment they deducted and kept aside due to the fact that the lockdown had affected their business...

Debtline is a big no no if you're shopping around for a reputable debt counseling solution.