Amo Cultural Care e il loro programma Lo raccomando a qualsiasi ragazz* stia prendendo in considerazione quest'agenzia per partire come au/bro pair Mi hanno reso il processo di matching semplice e sono capitata con una host family perfetta per me I love Cultural Care and their program I recommend it to any girl/boy considering this agency to travel like au/bro pair They made the matching process easy and I happened upon a host family that was perfect for me read more

PUBLIC SAFETY ALERT: Cultural Care Au Pair Fraud & Federal Non-Compliance Our experience with Cultural Care Au Pair in Ardsley, NY, has been a nightmare of document fraud, safety breaches, and corporate retaliation. If you are a parent who values the safety of your children, read this before signing a contract. 1. Vetting Fraud (Documented by Geico): The agency's profile for our au pair claimed she had been licensed since 2022. Our insurance carrier (Geico) ran a formal DMV check and proved she was not licensed until December 17, 2024. Cultural Care placed a novice driver with under 4 months of experience in our home. 2. Federal Non-Compliance (22 CFR § 62.31): Despite paying thousands in fees, the agency failed to meet basic U.S. Department of State regulations: Total Lack of Oversight: We were cycled through 5 different LCCs in 5 months. Safety Breaches: Our LCC failed to perform the mandatory in-person orientation and home visit. Unauthorized Strangers: We have Ring camera footage documenting our au pair bringing unvetted strangers into our home. When we reported this, the agency did nothing. Abandonment: The au pair abandoned her post mid-week, yet the agency (LCC) forced us to pay her a full weekly stipend for zero childcare. 3. Retaliation & The "Gag Order" Refund: When we demanded that the program function as advertised and follow federal laws, Director chose to terminate our family from the program rather than address the safety fraud. They are now withholding our refund for unused fees unless we sign a "Release of Claims"--a legal gag order designed to hide their negligence. We have refused to sign. 4. Corporate Hostility: Director and the corporate office have ignored our evidence of contract breach and are attempting to silence a family that caught them in a lie. They prioritize their "Matching Fees" over the life and safety of your children. DO NOT trust Cultural Care with your kids. They are not a childcare agency; they are a liability. read more

I had a very disappointing experience with Perla Cortes, an Extension Specialist at Cultural Care Au Pair. Rather than taking the time to understand my concerns as the host parent, Perla repeatedly contacted my au pair about whether we were extending, creating unnecessary pressure and making an otherwise positive relationship between my au pair and me awkward. We were actively discussing an extension together, but because I had questions about the financial breakdown and unexpected fees, I had not yet made a final decision. I was still well within the stated deadline. Instead of addressing my concerns, Perla seemed focused solely on getting an immediate commitment. When I didn't provide the answer she wanted, she abruptly changed the deadline and began assisting my au pair in finding a new host family--even though my au pair and I were still planning to extend together. This was unprofessional and undermined our ability to make a thoughtful decision together. My questions were simply about the costs and hidden fees associated with extending. Rather than explaining them or exploring whether there was any flexibility, Perla dismissed my concerns and essentially shamed me by telling me I was already receiving the lowest possible rate. As a loyal customer and a single mother on a resident physician's salary, I was hoping for understanding or at least a respectful conversation. Instead, I felt pressured, dismissed, and made to feel guilty for asking reasonable financial questions. The extension process should support both host families and au pairs, not create unnecessary stress or interfere with their communication. Unfortunately, my experience with Perla did exactly that. read more

This is a SCAM. Our experience with Cultural Care Au Pair was terrible. My family member, went as an Au Pair to USA. They sold her this amazing cultural exchange experience and becoming part of the family. She paid the fee. The families treated her like cheap labour and were very unfair. When she arrived to the first host family, the kid harassed her mentally and physically. Then she went to a second family where the mom didn't give her on-boarding, didn't give her a sim-card and make her work from 6 am to 5 pm, the host mom asked for rematch at day 3 due to AP not speaking her language (which she knew from before the match). Agency supported the families and guilt everything on the au pair. Then send her back home. The day after she arrived they called to ask if she wanted to continue. Don't use this company. They just care about profit. read more

I'm not sure what these people are thinking, but their au pair ABANDONED my child and I caught her red-handed! Next thing we know, their au pair was making up ridiculous accusations about my family. The company chose to believe her. We were investigated and everything was found to be false! STAY FAR AWAY FROM THIS COMPANY! They don't care about your children or your family. Cultural Care is purely disgusting. State Department and U.S. Counselor Officers notified!!! read more

We hosted 3 au pairs. Never had a problem or complaint until our last and final one. One of her friends rematched and moved away and I believe our au pair was jealous because her friend was set with a family with a big lake house. After that I noticed our au pairs mood shifted and she became very moody and short. After a couple days she sent us a text message saying she wanted to rematch and cited mental health struggles. We were fine with it. After she began the rematch process she asked if she could stay with us longer. I told her she needed to call the company and further discuss their process. 30 min later I got a call from the company (while I was at work) and they told me they were going to do an emergency removal of our au pair because she lied to them and told them we didn't have enough food in the house for her and our kids. I called the LCC and told her I wanted her removed immediately for her lies. The LCC accused me of having an attitude on the phone. I informed her that I was having a panic attack. She accused me of being a threat to the au pair (never threatened her or her safety) . I rushed home (I worked out of town 2 hours away) when I got home I took pictures of my pantry, refrigerator, freezer, and deep freezer as well as grocery orders since I have a lot of groceries delivered and emailed them to the company. I also emailed them proof of her asking to stay longer and her saying she was struggling with mental health issues. I explained to them how she was a huge liability. They did not address her mental health issues before matching her with a new family. They also asked if we wanted a new au pair. If we were such a danger then why would they want to place anyone else with us? Based on the proof I provided, they were fully aware that she was lying and had no issues placing her with another family. I feel that they are for profit only and don't care about families well being. Lies like that can get families in a lot of trouble. Definitely do not recommend. Edit To Add: When we asked to rematch for our second au pair because we realized she was not good with younger children, we put that on her profile and they removed it and placed her with even younger children!!!! PLEASE BE AWARE OF THEIR PRACTICES read more

I have been a host parent with cultural care for over 18 months. We had an expectation mismatch with our current au pair and wanted to go into rematch. The au pair was always on her phone and ignored our kindergartener which is not what we had enrolled in the program for; and the level of care provided was non existent. Cc rectified parts of the other issue after I posted here. read more

From Strong Advocates to Deeply Disappointed Our Experience with Cultural Care: From Strong Advocates to Deeply Disappointed For many years, our family was a strong advocate for Cultural Care and the au pair program as a whole. We encouraged numerous families to join. We defended the value of cultural exchange. We believed in the mission. We welcomed multiple au pairs into our home, including several who came from difficult family situations. We invested deeply in helping each of them succeed. Some stayed with us for shorter periods, others longer. We helped them travel, experience the United States, grow personally, and accomplish their goals. We often brought our au pairs on family trips and truly considered them part of our family. We loved turning negative au pair experiences into positive ones. Over multiple years, we built what we believed was a strong, trusting relationship with Cultural Care. Because of that history, it took overwhelming evidence of neglect and structural failures in the system for us to reach the point of writing this review and strongly discouraging families from using this program. Unfortunately, the final chapter of our experience with Cultural Care was deeply troubling. We were matched with two consecutive au pairs who both turned out to be completely inappropriate for childcare. In both cases, there was strong evidence of lying, deceit, misinformation, and lack of transparency during the matching process. In both cases, our children were placed in unsafe situations--situations that we are still working to emotionally and practically unravel months later. The examples below are meant to illustrate and give color to our experience, but they only scratch the surface of the broader issues we encountered. The first au pair caused significant emotional harm to our children. She was consistently rude and disregarded our family's boundaries about what was appropriate to discuss with young children. She repeatedly exposed them to frightening topics such as war, emergencies, and missing children alerts. She regularly told our well-behaved, kind, gifted children--who eat well, perform well in school, and are deeply loved--that they were "bad." Over time, they began to believe her. Our children would lock themselves in the bathroom crying just to get away from her. Watching your children lose confidence and feel unsafe in their own home is heartbreaking. No family should ever experience that. The second au pair was even more concerning. We were told she had strong driving experience and had been driving daily for years. This turned out to be completely false. She did not know how to turn on a car or put gas in it. We later learned she had been with multiple families within the Cultural Care system--yet we were only told about one. If proper screening and transparency existed, this would have been identified long before she was placed with us. More troubling than her lack of skills was her extremely poor judgment. There were multiple unsafe incidents that culminated in her abandoning our child in the middle of a city. We received messages from neighbors asking why our young child was running alone across a busy street. No parent should ever get that text. We immediately reported everything to Cultural Care and provided documentation. We made it very clear that we did not believe this individual should be rematched or placed in charge of children again. Despite this, she was placed with another family. That was the moment we fully lost trust. Cultural Care had clear evidence of dangerous behavior and chose to prioritize continuing placements over protecting children. Rather than being transparent, they minimized concerns, withheld information, and in some cases appeared to misrepresent the truth in order to keep the system moving. This is not just a failure of individuals. It is a failure of structure, accountability, and values. We were once proud ambassadors for this program. We defended it. We promoted it. We trusted it. Today, we cannot. When an organization consistently places families in harm's way, ignores documented safety concerns, and continues to rematch problematic au pairs, that is not cultural exchange--it is negligence. Our greatest disappointment is not just in what happened, but in how it was handled. Children's safety should never be secondary to profit, placement numbers, or reputation management. We are sharing our story so other families can make informed decisions. We entered this program with open hearts, good intentions, and years of loyalty. We are leaving it with deep regret. read more

Create additional profile to bring back an au pair in extension. Savannah is always knowledgeable, thorough and extremely responsive. I could never say enough good things about the level of service she provides. Truly truly one of cultural cares best assets. read more

Terribly unfair bad business, middle man business. This place is run by disgruntled old women, the authority figures we all know from school, who had nothing better to do but enforce rules and not caring about the bigger picture. These guys got my phone numbers and spam called me , then when it came down to a meeting, they discriminated against my cultural food attracting flies and discriminated against my house being slightly messy, after I had rescued a puppy who ripped up my house. Stay away. This place is run by a bunch of Karen's and they will always side with themselves . This place is a waste of time, after you add up all the fees and etc it doesn't even make sense . read more

Terrible experience overall. 3 au pairs in 8 months and the agency turns around on me saying I am the problem. The lack of experience first off- training the au pairs with your baby. Also, the lack of safety. My baby almost drowned 3x with my third au pair so I let her go on day 3. The agency said I needed her to stay in my house for 2 weeks. I refused as she seemed on drugs, not with it, and let my 1 year olds face go under the water 3 times. My first au pair overfed my baby so she could sleep. My second au pair left in the middle of the night (snuck out the back door without notice to go back to Mexico) I found an empty room in the morning. This was after hosting her for 6 months. I am a single mom with a baby, so finding that can be overwhelming and scary. After I told the agency- they had no reaction other than hmm ok, your rematch will be open soon. They're all about the money and don't care about the families. In the end they were wanting to look into my profile investigate me- instead of looking at how to possibly better the program and train au pairs. read more

I had the worst possible experience with Cultural Au Pair and would never recommend them. The au pair they placed in my home barely came out of her room before 2 p.m., never cooked my kids a fresh meal (just reheated frozen food), and didn't clean up after them. She showed no initiative, no engagement, and no real care for the kids. When I brought this to the agency, instead of helping fix the problem, she basically defended the au pair. I was met with insulting questions like, "Well, did you tell her she needed to do that?" As if cooking fresh meals, cleaning up after kids, and actually spending time with them isn't basic common sense for a childcare provider. The agency clearly prioritizes protecting their au pairs over supporting paying host families. They made me feel dismissed, unheard, and stuck with someone who was not doing her job. This program was sold to me as a cultural exchange and reliable childcare, but what I got was a lazy, disengaged au pair and an agency that couldn't care less about the host family's experience. Save yourself the stress look elsewhere read more

I would not recommend Cultural Care for host families or au pairs. It's very unorganized and the training they provide to au pairs is so minimal. They don't properly share expectations of what au pair life will be like childcare wise. The helpers (LCC) they have working with you are part time and really don't care that much and don't follow the Cultural Care procedures when unexpected things happen. We matched with an au pair 6 months ahead of when we'd need childcare to start for our infant son. We set up a whole floor in our house for her, were in constant communication etc. We paid $10,000 ahead of our au pair arriving. Our au pair also had to pay a lot to be able to come here. Our au pair gets here and seems bewildered that she can't stay in her routine that she had at home because she's watching an infant. Just no sense of what it's like to be a caretaker even though she was 'infant qualified' per the Cultural Care website. We liked her as a person and were going to try and see if she got in the swing of things. She lasts only one week before telling the LCC that she wants to move to a family with older kids, even though she knew for 6 months she'd be with a baby. Per Cultural Care's rules you're supposed to set up a meeting all together to try and work things out, but the LCC told her to go ahead and try to find a new family. So now as a new mom I am out of childcare after spending months setting up my house for this person to join our family and paying $10,000. You can 'rematch' with another au pair and see the reasons why they want to rematch. They are almost all delinquents. Or, you can wait 6+ weeks to get an au pair from out of the country. They only gave us a 40% refund on the $10,000 because we didn't want to find another au pair after our terrible experience. read more

To reply to CC's reply, this simply isn't the case. I let CC know of some very troubling issues and concerns with our au pair, but they had already entered her into a rematch within 2 hours of her abrupt departure from our home. There was no extensive anything and no follow up. And I am personally aware of another similar situation where an au pair was rematches with a family after causing some disturbing drama and publicly disparaging the host family. read more

So after making my review here, cultural care contacted me and did the right thing, when you have a company, the size of theirs it only takes one bad employee to have a bad experience, but I'll have to give them credit and this is why I'm updating this review once corporate found out they made it right read more

Au pair rep denied my eligibility to get an au pair because I have special needs kids.

I would like to recommend Andrea Coulson, local childcare coordinator. She is professional andg very caring. She is always available to your calls and needs. She is willing to house and help any au pair in need. read more

The only time cultural care proactively contacts with me is to get more money through renew or match. It seems that the organization is trying to rake in $$$ while minimizing support. For $11,245 program fee a year, it is very pathetic. We've used them for around 5 years (no other agency works in our local area) and I'm more and more hesitant working with them. Not only could they not keep a consistent LCC (local childcare contact person) in our region, when we do have local LCCs they are unhelpful. Asked about how to use insurance for the au pair, and we got no answer other than we need call the insurance ourselves. Asked about local courses that au pairs can take to satisfy visa requirements--no answer other than take Cultural Au Pair official courses. (in fact, one of our au pairs told us that their friend got told the wrong info and ended up having visa issues). No info, no events about our other local families. LCC contacted us with wrong names wrong addresses wrong profile info, LCC no show appointments, LCC not responding to emails, LCC trying to avoid work by only providing email contact (and stated "I can provide phone number on request"), when questions are asked LCC reports that "I've emailed cultural au pair about it" and then no info for the next several weeks. Generally unhelpful and uninterested in helping the internationals and families here. No accountability for the agency. I've complained to the national office with the info above and things improve minimally before sliding back to default un-helpfulness. Also au pairs show up with pretty much no training. Do not know basic visa requirements (credits needed, needing local driver's license), was not taught how to be successful (au pair told us agency said "just do what the family asks you to do"), no communication structure (families are totally on their own with meeting topics). When I do meet other families in person, seems that majority are frustrated. I feel bad for these poor girls who navigating in a new country all by themselves and had no clear idea of what they signed up for. read more

The au pair herself is great. However, there have been several very important miscommunications between the agency and myself. Initially I read that an au pair can't care for a child less than 3 months of age. So I advertised that I would start with an au pair in August, when my child would be 4 months old. I interviewed an au pair who indicated that she could start in August but wanted to start earlier. When I asked the company if this was ok, they told me that it was up to the comfort level of the au pair. She was comfortable starting when he was 6 weeks old. The company sanctioned the match knowing full well the anticipated date of delivery of my son. Then, they called and requested that the au pair start 5 days early. After the au pair had flown to Seattle, and already watched my son for a few days, someone else from the agency contacts me and tells me that she isn't allowed to care for my son until he is 3 months old. Well, he is 2 months old. I am now expected to spontaneously find child care for a month. I paid 11k, and set everything up with this agency months ago - disclosing all details about circumstance truthfully. But now I am told that if the au pair watches my son alone before the age of 3 months she will be sent back to her home country. Not only is this of course my problem to solve, there is no acknowledgement from the agency that they did anything wrong or that there is even a problem. Will I have the au pair for 12 months? Effectively, I will only have her for 10.5 months. More losses for me to eat. Second, host families are told that they must provide a car and auto insurance to the au pair. The au pairs believe this to be true. But when a family refuses after the au pair has arrived, and I have known that it has happened, the company sides with the family and the au pair is just out of luck. This company picks and chooses which aspects of the contract they wish to follow, and then dumps on whichever party is the more convenient scapegoat - the au pair or the host family. read more

Note: this is a reflection on the Cultural Care agency itself, not our au pair. After a lot of research and recommendations, I decided to go with Cultural Care to contract an au pair for my kids. I cannot recommend this agency since the apparent tendency is to wash their hands of any problems, while subjecting young people who come on this "cultural exchange" to poor treatment. After an involved interview process, we decided to match with an au pair (I'll call her M for privacy). M arrived, adapted quickly, and has been great with my kids. However, when I tried to help her set up her phone service, we discovered it was on the "stolen/lost" phone list at Verizon, even though she had purchased the phone herself directly from Apple back in January, with the very minimal required program salary paid to her by the previous family. Verizon tells us that they can see that the phone had been put on this list by the previous person paying the bill - which was M's host family. She had started off on a positive note with them, but due to a misunderstanding, they allegedly kicked her out of their house, demanding she leave in a matter of hours (in the middle of the night), demanded she give back her salary, refused to pay her pending hours, and told her she did not qualify to work with children, to be an au pair, etc. - what I understand to be abusive behavior. I realize there are two sides to every story, but even if only part of what M told me was true, it is unacceptable treatment on the part of the family towards this young woman. Fast forward, I spend hours with M trying to set her phone up with Mint, AT&T, and they all tell me the phone is bricked, and can only be unlocked by the person who reported it as lost/stolen. At this point, I reach out to Cultural Care. And while the people have been entirely nice and try to help, they have washed their hands of the situation. They apparently can't get in touch with the previous host family that allegedly blocked M's phone, which is incomprehensible since they now have a new au pair through Cultural Care. All the family needs to do is call Verizon and reverse the block, but the agency can't even get them on the phone? M is now with a bricked phone that cost her nearly $1000, which is weeks and weeks of salary based on what au pairs are paid through this State Department program. Cultural Care won't take responsibility even though they're the intermediary in this situation, and both M and I paid to join the program. I asked them to give M some sort of credit or financial support on this, since she never would have been in this situation if not for Cultural Care, but they are not taking any responsibility. I have talked to countless people and the only "solution" is to talk to a counselor. Meanwhile, I have an au pair doing the best job she can, but clearly upset about this situation and the money she has lost. 1 star since I can't give 0 for the agency itself. I expect a lot more support for these young people given the expense of the program and the way they market it as a cultural exchange, when in the end, if you get stuck with the wrong family, it can become an abusive situation. Still waiting on Cultural Care to do the right thing for this young woman. read more

They have horrible customer service. They don't answer their main phone number, their support number doesn't even ring, and they don't answer their emails at all. This was such a horrible experience, and my problems are not being solved. It does not seem as though they value customers at all. I would not recommend their service at all. read more

If I could give them 0 stars I would. Awful experience. Au Pairs have no interest in your child or childcare. They just want to party late everyday. When they are done with a location they go to the next to party triggering a "rematch" The company fails to uphold its contractual obligations and provide adequate childcare. They are very communicative when it's time to collect your money other than that they are of no assistance and take zero accountability for anything with the au pair. Do not give them your money you'll be sorry. Your au pair will abandon your child in a few months to go experience his/her next location and the company will do NOTHING to assist you. read more

My husband and I were really looking forward to welcoming an Au pair into our home. We thought it could be a great option for childcare, while also serving as a positive cultural experience for both our family, as well as the au pair themself. Unfortunately, we were extremely disappointed with Cultural Care. They've demonstrated to us multiple times that they have very little integrity, and they do a poor job vetting, preparing, and training au pairs in order to set all parties up for success. These are all reasons why we've left the au pair program. After having two different au pairs living with us, it's become clear that many of them arrive with an inflated sense of entitlement, and are looking to leach as much as they can out of their host family, while doing as little work as possible. We went into this experience with a positive mindset and a lot of enthusiasm. We were excited to provide a wonderful experience for an au pair, while inviting them into our family. But after our experience, we would not recommend Cultural Care - or having an Au pair in general - to anyone. The one positive thing I can say, is regarding our LCC (local care consultant). She was amazing, and worked very hard to help support host families and au pairs as best she could. But there's only so much an LCC can do, and the entitled princess attitude is too hard to fight. read more

Wow, this place discriminates! They said that it's a problem that my child is transgender, that my other child was adopted from foster care, and that I'm disabled. They blocked me and didn't tell me until I kept emailing. Then they asked for a phone call and were very accusatory. I had spoken with Melissa, their matching specialist, who said she would help me and then ghosted me for weeks. Even in their response to my comments, they make up accusations against me like I hung up on a staff member? That never happened. Wow. It is sad that instead of investigating what happened and considering their inclusion practices around lgbtq and disabled families, they will tell you the problem is the disabled and lgbtq family. read more

Just a truly awful company at all levels. My wife and I were very excited to host an au pair, so we signed up for this site. We had a video call with our LCC and honestly we were taken aback by her lack of professionalism and knowledge. She opened the call without saying hello or doing introductions and just rambled for 5 mins. She blamed several things on "the website" saying she has no control over it. She then put our account on hold without talking to us first and then accidentally deleted our account requiring us to re-register and awkwardly explain to our connections why we had to reconnect with them. Wildly unprofessional and just honestly a mess caused entirely by her lack of ability to perform her job function. We called the support line only to find out there is no customer support, we talked to a random person in finance who was on a call center rotation. She gave us completely wrong information on the first call then called back to apologize and say basically everything she told us was wrong. The website itself is awful, with frequent errors and bugs. There are several au pairs who should show up in our search because we've logged them in a spreadsheet but they don't show up and no one can explain why. They are still active and within our search criteria. On top of all of that, you're only allowed 3 connections at a time, which is extremely limiting and slows the entire process down unnecessarily. Most families would reasonably want to interview 5-10 candidates before deciding and this creates an unnecessary barrier. None of CC's competitors have this restriction and it's SO much easier to facilitate conversation and so much faster to get through the interview process. Ultimately, I hope this company fails and I'm confident they will in time. There are so many better options out there. If you're considering an au pair, do not waste your time!! read more

Cultural Care fails to mention that only about 25% of their Au Pairs are successful in completing their year with the same family they started with. There is probably about a 50% success rate of Au Pairs that go into rematch with their second family and finish. It's not uncommon for Au Pairs to change families 3 or even 4 times during their term and Cultural Care will brush over major incidents and red flags to make them seem minor. Read paperwork, profiles, and transition documents CAREFULLY because 75% of the truth is missing from it. If there is a minor incident on there, contact the former host family because it's likely a bigger issue that will put your children in danger. Cultural Care advertises "QUALITY Child Care" when they should be advertising "Good Enough Child Care". Apparently anyone can be an Au Pair if you can pay the fees, experience or not. The company will back any lies needed to get the money. Usually Au Pair candidates intentions are false - some are here for money, some are here to better their life back home, most want to learn English and travel, and very few come to actually be with children. Proceed with caution and don't ever pay in full because when it doesn't work out, they will not refund you! read more

Cultural Au Pair is the most disorganized, crazy company I have ever worked with. I was trying to get my Au Pair matched and their app did not work. The LCC was not very helpful. The Au Pair was just a disaster. I don't think they even do background checks or get references on these people. I had such a disaster with trying to get matched and rematched After only one month of having this person come into my house completely destroy her room with garbage bags, everywhere, wine bottles, and she was only 19 years old. She had pictures of my daughter in the garbage. I called the company to complain and they had every single excuse and did not try to rectify the situation. I tried to go into the rematch program, but because their app was not working I was not able to do so. I would contact them every day and each department blamed somebody else. I contacted them for a refund being that I only had an Au Pair in my house for less than a month because I had to pay thousands of dollars to get this girl at my house. They said no and then eventually said yes. It has been months and I have still not received my refund. There is this one girl Alyssa from the company who I was contacting about my refund. Every time I reach out for more information they tell me there's another document that needs to be signed? I have signed every document. I have done everything that I'm supposed to do. They had to put fictitious addresses in my app in order for me to even look at Au Pair's. They were not able to correct the app according to my personal information for well over a month. Every time I tried to fix it it just got worse and worse. And I have been reaching out to Alyssa multiple times asking about my refund and I am just getting blown off left and right. They're supposed to give me over $2000 back. They told me it would be around Christmas time and here we are in January the middle of January pretty much and I have not received my refund nor any response from Alyssa. I have called the company and every time I call I'm on hold for over an hour. The last time I spoke with this Alyssa person that is supposed to be from the corporate office. She told me to call the corporate office and speak with them because she has no more information for me. I am telling you do not use this company you will regret it. read more

Our family has been hosting since August and it was the greatest decision we have ever made. We selected an Air Pair that was in rematch and she will be with us for six months. Cultural Care has been a great resource and it's great to have them desk with paperwork, travel, visas, etc. They were quicker and had better customer service than the two other agencies we considered. We have been through the selection process a second time now and the process was very smooth and we received a lot of support from our matching specialist. We really enjoy our Local Rep who sets up fun events for the Au Pair's so that they can develop a strong social network and find travel partners. This is a great program to bring together different cultures and receive childcare from someone who is more like an older sibling vs just a caretaker. read more

We were a host family for years. While we had great experience the first 2 years, everything declined after that. We had a rotating door of LCCs that gave us advice that was contrary to advice published by Cultural Care in their blogs (and one time got in trouble for asking the au pair to dust the lighting fixture in her bathroom, which the LCC said was ok, then the company later said was not), au pairs that lied about substantial things during the interview process or while with us (said they drove daily when they had never actually driven a car before and didn't know the gas from the brake, said they didn't have a boyfriend when they'd actually been dating someone for 7 years, lied to us about where they took our kids during the day, damaged our car while driving and didn't tell us about it, put unauthorized transactions on our debit card), etc.  The straw broke for us when our last au pair came out of her room, opened a warm beer, chugged it in 30 seconds in front of the kids and then left the house. After discussing our options with the agency, they decided to remove us from the program because the au pair wanted to move to a family that didn't recycle or compost and regularly took her to eat fast food. They only refunded half of our money and didn't require the au pair to provide childcare through the agreed upon date. We had a week to find childcare for our three young kids.  Cultural Care never took responsibility for creating a terrible host family experience on a number of occasions. I'd go with another agency -- or do daycare or a nanny. The au pairs are just increasingly immature and entitled and ended up being such an emotional burden to have in the house. read more

Our au pair has become a huge part of our family and I know she loves my children like her own. The extra set of hands and flexibility is unmatched! We will be so sad to say goodbye to her after 2 years, but are also excited for what the future holds. Our LCC and everyone at Cultural Care has been extremely helpful and supportive. read more

Cultural Care Au Pair - Child Care & Day Care Near Me - Cambridge, Massachusetts

This program is the best ! You get the best experience of your life .. You see and meet new lovi people

Horrible, awful, zero accountability for Au pairs if they don't work out for a family because they aren't fit to be watching children. They let them rematch setting another family up for failure when the Au Pairs should just be sent back to where they came from. I would never recommend this agency to anyone. They claim they make the Au Pairs take a unique "personality test". It's 10 questions. They'll take anyone willing to spend money!!!! I e couldn't let our Au Pair stay in our home because she was only capable of doing the dishes. Per this agency you have to provide shelter and food for 2 weeks. So we had to pay even more money to out her in a hotel room for 2 weeks. When the agency should've put her in a plane back home. As this Au Pair wasn't suitable to be watching children of any age. She had an aganda to be here to travel and site see. NOT TAKE CARE IF CHILDREN. There was no exchange of cultural just a selfish kid trying to see American. Completely awful experience that cost us thousands of dollars. read more

The au pairs can leave you for no reason! They do not care if your baby is attached to them. The agency is there only for au pairs and not the families. The customer service sucks! They keep saying we give you a call and they don't. There is no commitment for au pairs they can leave you anytime with no reason this is so unfair to families and poor kids! Done waste your time and money here.... read more

When I set out to be a host mom, I interviewed every agency and then set up a spreadsheet to compare all the pros and cons. (I had a lot more time on my hands during maternity leave.) In the end I went with Cultural Care because they had the most candidates, and ran the program like a business, which meant the support was full service. We are going into our third year of being a host family and I couldn't be happier. Each year is unique. Every year has been a blessing. I love my first two au pairs as my own daughters, and they have spent considerable time three-way calling my incoming au pair to make her feel a part of the family before she even arrives. I travel a ton for work, and having a constant and loving presence has enhanced our family's life beyond words. I am obsessed with our community manager, Melissa. She has become a great friend, she gives amazing insight and relevant advice - all of which have helped forge even stronger ties with my au pairs. She has a knack with young adults, and plans great activities that pull our Au Pair community together. I also want to give a shout out to Molly, our matching specialist. While we only talk a couple times a year, I still feel such kinship with her. I have been really happy with the support of Cultural Care, especially when I compare notes with other friends who use other agencies. Thank you for advocating to continue this special J1 program in the US. We would definitely be less happy and not as well rounded if it weren't for our au pairs! read more

Cultural Care Au Pair - Halloween party with our au pair (it was COLD) - Child Care & Day Care Near Me - Cambridge, Massachusetts

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TLDR: unethical company that will scam you out of 40% of your fees by unfairly terminating host families. Company will soon be bankrupt due to mandated increase in au pair stipend in 2024. Try Au Pair in America or Interexchange for better refund policy, if you're still considering au pair programs at $40k a year. Imagine this, you spend hundreds of hours browsing au pair profiles and interviewing with minimal support, only to get an emotionally unstable teenager who keeps your kids alive (but hungry and bored) while on on her phone constantly, and calling out sick for serious health conditions not disclosed on the profile, while you spend copious after work hours cleaning up after your au pair and calling body shops since the au pair crashed your car. Then, cultural care suddenly terminates your contract and leaves you completely without childcare with 0 notice, pocketing 40% of your money. Yes, that happened to me. Do yourself a favor and sign up for any other au pair service other than Cultural Care. This agency will remove host families based on special needs child, or any complaints from its au pairs and pocket 40% of all fees. It has gotten much more unethical and greedy as of late since Cultural Care is on the verge of losing most of its business due to the drastic increase in au pair stipend next year. Starting next year, families in CA, NY, CO, WA, and other HCOL areas will be expected to pay upwards of $40k for an au pair who is likely far more interested in social media browsing, traveling, than actually caring for your kids. Families in MA already pay nearly $40k a year for full time au pair services. Naturally, none of this is reflected in Cultural Care's marketing material (but it sure is in the financial agreement that host families would be responsible for paying state minimum wage plus 10% increases annually). Cultural Care habitually omits critical medical info and negative experiences from host families in au pair profiles, leading to many failed rematches. I echo the sentiment from another reviewer that the company is largely white and biased against POC. I have text messages from Local Care Consultants making racist remarks against black South African and South American au pairs, and preferentially promoting European au pairs. I can only imagine what the LCCs may say about us non-white host families behind our backs. For an agency that supposedly promotes cultural exchange and inclusion, they need some serious anti-racist training. For host families that are considering the program, pay in installments so you can cut your losses. I sure wish I did. read more

I wish I had read these reviews before we went with a CCAP or just an AP. My wife and I have two kids, both under 3, and we lasted in the program for less than 6 months after going through 2 APs. The first one was from Columbia, and she showed her true colors of being an entitled princess immediately. After our first introduction meeting with our LCC, she walked outside of our house, nudged our LCC, and asked her if the HF was going to give her a credit card for her expenses while she stayed with us. After that, the entitlement, lack of empathy, and terrible childcare exponentially grew until after one month, we needed to protect our children, so we went to rematch. Our second AP was from Italy. Having traveled to Italy many times, and loving the Italian people and culture, we thought it would be great to have an Italian in our home. Same story different day. Our AP lied to us from the get-go. She moved into our house and was smoking cigarettes in our garage for the first week. Smoking at all is not allowed by CCAP. That should have been the red flag for us, but I was 23 once and thought smoking was cool, so maybe we can give her a pass. She failed to tell us that she was a vegetarian but didn't eat fruit, or didn't really like vegetables. (She only wanted to eat pasta and pizza... maybe just live in Italy?) Well, she ended up being emotionally volatile, oftentimes crying in the middle of the day, not paying attention to our children while talking to her friends in Italy throughout the day, being generally unclean, and devoid of empathy towards us as her host parents. We have two children under 3. As CCAP leads on HFs, having another set of hands in the house SHOULD be helpful. Instead, we were left with nightly stressful conversations about "what did ##### do today?" We did NOT sign up to parent a 23-year-old when we started this program. Our LCC was comforting and helpful for dealing with her, but these APs don't listen to anyone. They didn't come here to work. They came here to travel, not work, and be given a bunch of money for not doing anything. No thank you. We brought all these concerns to CCAP. We were given the standard 40% refund or whatever, and we read the riot act on this AP that she was stealing from us and hoarding our personal belongings in our house, she was a liability for childcare because she was emotionally volatile, and she lied to us about smoking! On top of that, she was the cheapest person I've maybe ever dealt with. She would go out with her other AP friends on a weekend day for 10+ hours and not SPEND $1 ON FOOD FOR HERSELF. Instead, she would wait to come back and then proceed to make a huge mess of our kitchen, and eat way more food than is humanly possible for one person, and food that is meant to feed our whole family for the week. After telling CCAP all of this, and that if CCAP decided to rematch this AP, and we strongly suggested against it, that we felt it was our duty to be a reference to a new HF because they should know what kind of person they are welcoming into their home. Well, do you think CCAP allowed her to rematch, and did anyone call us for a reference? No. As others have said, CCAP does not care about what situation they put HF in. They only care about money. Ironic that the culture that they have created, is devoid of care! It was possibly the longest and most stressful six months of my life, and my wife's life. Do NOT go with CCAP. Do NOT think that an au pair will provide quality child care. Do NOT think this will improve your life. Do NOT think that you will save money compared to other child care options. Just bite the bullet and send your kid to the expensive day care or preK. Sure your kid will get sick, and you'll probably be cash poor, but you won't have an entitled 23-yr old in your house causing you stress with no support from the company that put them there! read more

Cultural Care is a scam. The APs are incentivized to tell you whatever they possibly can to get to the US, then they do whatever they want. CC takes all money in advance, plus thousands from the AP. This is a racket. Seriously, I'm shocked that the government hasn't shut them down already. read more

We brought an au pair into the country on a national interest exemption waiver due to my wife's work as an essential worker, and within five days the au pair hit one of our children and decided to rematch because the kids' car seats were dirty and I wear flannel shirts (this is not an exaggeration). We reached out multiple times to the agency in those first five days and they offered little to no support. Cultural Care promptly matched the au pair with another family having never discussed the "allegation" with us. When we were finally able to contact them later, Cultural Care told us that an investigation had occurred. We were flabbergasted: what investigation could possibly have taken place if they never even consulted us regarding the incident in which our 5 year old was hit?! Cultural Care claims that the subsequent host family was informed of the "allegation" but refused to share any evidence or documentation of that claim. They then only offered their standard "60% of unused fees" refund, despite the abundant evidence that they failed to support the au pair or our family, and they certainly did not provide the training that they had us pay for. In other words, by bringing au pairs in and failing to train them properly or support families properly, Cultural Care actually profits. And we, as a host family, ended up out several thousand dollars for a cumulative total of 3 hours of child care, in which the caregiver hit our child. After multiple levels of escalation and being hung up on by management over the course of two months, Cultural Care eventually offered us a *partial* refund in exchange for not discussing their agreement or the company. No thanks. This company is absolutely bereft of a moral compass and appears to be constitutionally unable to do the right thing. If you are considering an au pair, I strongly recommend you look elsewhere. read more

I wish I had listened to the numerous and plentiful negative reviews about this company before I had to experience the havoc they wreaked in my life. My desire was to find safer for COVID childcare and have a fun cultural exchange. I ended up with tearful, calls to Cultural Care trying to protect my family from someone who damaged our property, hid sharp knives from our kitchen in their room, and didn't follow the house rules (including not brining in people that we didn't approve into our house) that cultural care happily sent on to another unwitting family. We had a nanny come in to watch our kid in the period where Cultural Care was refusing to remove this person from my house after putting my family in danger Once an au pair is in your home, even if your au pair doesn't follow your rules and engages in risky and dangerous behavior Cultural Care is way more interested in preserving their worker pipeline rather than you having a good experience, likely because they already have your money. If you need someone out quickly due to the danger they pose, Cultural Care will not be your help and advocate. I was so disappointed with this company, but now we have a wonderful nanny that is worth the piece of mind from a childcare professional rather than a young kid who was sold a travel experience by a company who fails to support their families (because there are always new people in the pipeline, they only need to care about their au pair pipeline and sucker new families into their "program."). I was on the fence with this company, and I wish I had listened to thr reviews and listen to the tidy white lies that explained these negative experiences away. read more

One of the care coordinators, Kaitlynn Mayhew, sent a au pair to our home with an undisclosed mental condition. This au pair had a mental breakdown while in our home and put our child in danger. The au pair also got a citation for texting while driving our car (with my toddler in the car). She failed to pay the fine and failed to appear in court. This was documented evidence that the au pair put my child in danger. Cultural care then placed the au pair with another family. I am sure they again did not disclose her mental condition and history of child endangerment. When they finally removed the au pair from our home, she tried to steal one of our laptops and a credit card. We told the LCC, Carla Matlin, about this incident, but she did not even help us retrieve our stollen items. We had to ask the au pair to empty all of her bags until we found the laptop. Please do your own research before inviting one of these au pairs into your home. read more