How to become a Credit Counselor

A customer visits a credit counsellor and discloses details about their income, spending, and debts. A credit counsellor assesses a client's financial condition and assists in developing a strategy to minimise debts and create assets. Credit counsellors must first grasp their customers' total financial status before they can assist them. This involves assessing their monthly income, the worth of their assets, the quantity of their debt, the identity of their creditors, the interest rates applied to their loans, and so on. Credit counsellors frequently interact and negotiate on their clients' behalf with creditors (and other relevant parties such as banks).

• A credit counsellor provides financial counselling to individuals in debt. Discuss with the client about available monthly income after living expenses to meet credit obligations.
• Calculate the number of funds available to plan a payoff method and estimate the time for debt liquidation.
• Contact creditors to explain the client's financial situation and arrange for payment adjustment so that payments are feasible for the client and agreeable to creditors.
• Establishes payment priorities to reduce clients' overall costs by first liquidating high interest, short-term loans or contracts.
• Opens account to creditors as agent for the client.
• Keeps records of account activity.
• Be a budget consultant to an individual or family on financial problems such as excessive spending and borrowing of funds.

• A Credit Counselor should have good communication skills in order to negotiate effectively with clients and creditors.
• They should have good knowledge about computers and accounting software and be good in mathematics.
• Able to listen to people's problems without judging them
• Enjoy gathering information and working with numbers
• Respect for private information; ability to maintain client confidentialities
• Knowledge of debt reduction methods, such as repayment plans and bankruptcy
• Knowledge of collection practices and policies

• Non-profit organization
• Credit counseling company
• Government organizations