Adoption Agency

If you want to adopt a child selecting the right adoption agency for your situation is extremely important.  Below we have listed information to help you make the right choices.

Selecting the right child adoption agency to help you is very important.  An adoption agency can be for-profit or non-profit, can be public or private, and can be licensed or unlicensed.  The most important is that agencies are licensed, and you are advised to only work with a fully licensed non-profit agency.

Ask any agency you call for their adoption licensing authority and the phone number you can call to check that they are legitimate.

Find an agency whose staff will be available to help you seven days a week. Many birth mothers deliver babies on weekends or holidays so make sure to find an agency that will be available to assist you 7-days/week.

Next, you want to make sure the agency meets your needs. Take some time to develop a list of questions that are important to you and make sure they are able to address your concerns.  Below we have briefly listed some of the areas that you may want to ask about.

1. Make sure they are licensed as a child adoption agency and not as a facilitator or referral service.  To check if an agency or organization is licensed, contact them and ask for their license number and the phone number of the licensing authority. Then call the authority and confirm that the information given to you is correct. Ask the licensing authority if there are any irregularities in the agencies history. Every state has a licensing authority and each one will be glad to answer your questions.
2. Find out what types of child adoption they conduct.  Do they conduct open and closed adoptions, domestic and international, interstate and intrastate?
3. Do they use short term or long term foster care placements or direct placement of the child?
4. What are their restrictions.  Can they help you regardless of your age, whether or not you have other children in the home, your marital status and history,etc?
5. Find out about their Home Study and screening process.  Are your Home Study sessions group or individual sessions and how many visits will need to take place.
6. What are the qualifications and experience of the person who interviews you.
7. And ask what type of verification they get about your income, health and employment.
8. Check out what say you will have in selecting the birth mother and baby.
9. How and when are your fees paid to the agency?  Get the total fees to be paid and not just those to the agency but also to hospitals, doctors, attorneys, etc.
10. Are their birth mother and birth father counselors specially trained and qualified and not just another staff person who is hired to answer routine questions.
11. Never be pressured.  If anyone tries to "sell" you, we suggest you find someone else to work with.  Finally, make sure the agency goes over all your options and not just what they offer.

For additional help regarding selecting a domestic or an international adoption agency please visit AdoptionServices.org and the page adoption agencies.