In recent months many agencies have notified their clients that the wait time for a referral is going up. Where previously it may have been 3-6 months, now agencies are quoting 12-18 or even 18 to 24 months. PAP’s are understandably frustrated at the increasing waits and the seeming slowdown of referrals. Is there a slow down? Are there fewer referrals coming out?
In fact, there were actually more placements made in April than any other month since agencies began receiving licenses in January 2006. According to the government update quoted on the CHI blog there were 120 placements in that one month alone. If that number were a monthly average, that would mean approximately 1400 children adopted from Vietnam this year. Now it may turn out that April had an unusually high number of placements, but according to the report, 780 children have been adopted from Vietnam in the 17 months since adoptions reopened. At it’s peak before the shutdown, 766 children were adopted from Vietnam (in 2002). So 1400, or even 800 adoptions in one year would be a significantly high number for Vietnam.
So why does it seem like there are fewer referrals to be had? There’s a lot more agencies working in Vietnam now … 42 licensed agencies, at last count. While some agencies are getting licensed in new provinces where no other agencies operate, most agencies are overlapping in a number of provinces. (Nicki nicely organized the agencies according to province for us, just take a look at the list.)
It may be tempting to look at that list and then choose an agency that is the only one working in a particular province. Logic would say that agency would be able to get more and faster referrals because there is no competition. However, we adopting parents know nothing is ever that simple. The truth is that some provinces are very difficult to work with – so most agencies may decide it’s not worth the headache. Or it may be the case that some provinces are very difficult to work with in an ethical manner – “tips” or “unpublished fees” may be required to get paperwork through the system. Or it may be that some provinces are not well-versed in the international adoption process making the gathering of documents a cumbersome task. And often it seems that once one agency has gotten started in a new province it is easier for other agencies to expand into the area. So that agency may not have sole referral rights for very long.
There can be advantages to multiple agencies working in one province. For instance, if your agency tells you their fees are higher in certain provinces (as was mentioned in a previous post) you could call the other agencies that work in the same province and ask if they also have higher fees. Nothing keeps agencies honest like a little openness and accountability! Also, provinces where multiple agencies are licensed are often larger and have more orphanages as well as more experience in processing international adoptions. It’s likely that adoptions have more predictable timelines in those areas.
So what is a Prospective Adoptive Parent to do?
First, adjust your expectations. The days of quick referrals from Vietnam are over. (Any agency promising quick referrals should be received with a great deal of caution and objective research before signing.)
Second, look for an agency with strong credentials and even stronger ethics. Working in more provinces will allow an agency to give more referrals; however if an agency is stretched thin or employing in-country staff with little experience or poor reputations it could mean serious problems for you down the road.
Third, look at the big picture. The wait for a referral is hard, but it will be worth it in the long run. Hundreds of children are finding families every month and that is nothing short of miraculous.
13 Responses
Great overview of the issue, Chris. I often wonder if the seeming decline in referrals is actually more about an increase in the number of waiting parents. If the initial program last year had few families participating, then referrals would have been more obvious. Now there are all kinds of families interested in the program so although referrals may be coming at the same rate, there are many many more people “in line” so it actually feels like a slow down.
I agree with you 100% that the expectations need to be altered. This is so important.
Thanks for the great post – and some insight that I hadn’t had before about the pros and cons of being the only agency in a province. I agree with Nicki – I think a huge part of the “longer” wait times is the rapid influx of families into the program – more demand than supply, to put it in blunt business terms. I think a lot of agencies keep taking families beyond their capacity for serving those families in a reasonable timeframe. But obviously families are willing to wait – perhaps because they believe in agency they’ve picked, or perhaps because they had previously considered China who has similar waits anyway. And I wonder how many agencies simply overestimated as they opened their program how many referrals they’d get. I do worry about those agencies who, months after beginning their program, are somehow still able to offer near-instant referrals…
I LOVE this site and wish it had been up when I was choosing my agency. One more thing to remember when looking at your list is we are not the only country facilitating adoptions in Vietnam. Even though it may look like there is only one agency in a certain province, that doesn’t mean France or another country is not also working out of that same province and receiving referrals.
Ok, but what I really want to know is, when is my referral coming? KIDDING!
I totally would have waited for a referral with my first agency, who I am convinced is absolutely dedicated to finding families for children and not vice versa. I was incredibly fortunate to have the chance to be number 1 on the list with an agency I believe is equally ethical. No adoptions have taken place yet in that province (at least with U.S. agencies) so it remains very unpredictable what the timeline will be.
Really good point Tracy! Thanks for pointing that out… we get so focused on American adoptions sometimes we forget there are a number of other countries adopting from Vietnam.
I have to agree with previous commenters and say that I believe a lot of the long referral waits are due to the enormous amount of new families in the program. There are probably a similar amount of referrals coming in but the program has swelled so much that parents are now facing long waiting lists. Of course there will always be variations…obviously the very large agencies with 100+ people waiting for referrals are going to have long waits. Compare that with our agency, who this spring only had about 13 families waiting for referrals (yet infant girl referrals are nearing a 1 year wait) and there will be big discrepancies.
Of course quick infant girl referrals are certainly something to raise an eyebrow to. Especially when they come from the same agencies, same provinces…over and over again. In my book that is not a normal variation of referrals. Why do some agencies & provinces have refer just a few infant girls a year and other are referring them left and right? If someone says it has to do with the provinces simply having more infant girls…well yes I would agree but that’s not much of an explanation. Why the endless amount of baby girls? That is the question that would need to be asked.
I just found this site after a year of waiting! (Not to mention an additional year of waiting for China before we started our Vietnam adoption, and a year of infertility…. But I digress). What’s frustrating to me is that we started this process before the huge influx of so many more families but now we seem to be “competing” with them for children. Meaning: my dossier was done and in Vietnam before all the people who learned about the China rules and decided to switch. But many of them who sent dossiers in this winter (Feb and later) but who are with quicker agencies may be traveling before those of us whose dossiers have been in country since November/December. So frustrating!
Now and then, old agencies with resource and initiative, or new agencies, both add new orphanages and provinces to their list (as the Vietnamese government becomes more familiar with the administration of the program).
If you Google often and inform often about old and new agencies’ news, you’ll be able to get in at the right time and get short referral wait as people did in 2006.
PS: You often see hundreds of toddlers in orphanages but orphanages do have to take care of a few abandoned infants all the time.
PS: Amazing videos:
http://youtube.com/watch?v=XaPCOxxOUf8
http://youtube.com/watch?v=SKdJTYi32BI
So, what is the current (in general) wait time for a referral from Vietnam? Anybody know?
I think if you are using an ethical agency the wait would be 9-18 months for a boy and 12-24 months for a girl. Check out Nicki’s site for a list of ethical agencies and their wait times.
Sorry, I should have said “infant girl” and “infant boy”.
Please tell me what Nicki’s site is.
Thanks!
Not the best agency (in-country support for one) but fast referral: http://rothvinson.blogspot.com/
4/23/2007: Dossier to Viet Nam (DTV!).
7/2/2007: REFERRAL