Ascend Autism — Local services in Greenwich

Ascend Autism literally did more damage to my son then they EVER helped. We got nothing but the run around. They took forever to administer the necessary assessments for the insurance, after having our information since late 2022. Family strong diagnosed him Aug/Sept 2022 and sent all the information to this company. We didn't even get the assessments started until early April. They severely lacked in communication with us. They had therapists, then they didn't. They had someone finally, then called to tell us the person had a restraining order with someone that was about a mile away and they had to find someone else. They hired someone in June but this was ONLY for summer this person could not any hours once my son school was going to start in the fall. Then one day, they sent an email and said they would be at my home June 20th, and they would be here all summer from 11am till 3pm. I made sure the entire summer was open for them, so we could all learn together. I am a substitute teacher and I have the summer off. The only positive thing I can say is their BCBA Shelly was amazing. She is their only saving grace. The therapist they hired, constantly cancelled, and I called and would let them know. The thing is, she would promise my son she would see him tomorrow. Then cancel or be late or leave early. My son is very very specific about time and routines. Between June 20th thru July 11th. We never got 20 hours worth of therapy. They currently still owe us over 20 hours of service that was never performed. Once they found out that my insurance was being adjusted for August 1st. They called and told me they would not bother wasting anymore time finding a therapist for my son. I cried and cried and told them how awful they have been to us. How awful they were to my son. They did not care. Just that was nothin they could do, and if I wanted I could let the current therapist show up when she could. Why ? To do MORE damage to my son? They just wanted to collect the insurance. They let me go and NEVER checked on us after. Never offered us any alternatives. As soon as they heard an insurance was being adjusted they dropped us. LITERALLY SAID THEY WOULDN"T WASTE ANY more time looking for a new therapist for my son. Never gave me any other monetary options or suggestions on how to handle anything. We have been struggling and struggling and this company made LOADS of promises. They delivered on nothing. I literally looked into getting an appeal on our insurance but this company did not care. I literally sobbed on the phone, and though our insurance didn't end till August 1st they still didn't feel like my child was worth the effort. This was the first time my son was supposed to receive services. He was DESTROYED emotionally and socially by this company. STAY AWAY FROM THIS COMPANY. They only care about doing assessments and collecting insurance money. I wrote to government agencies and including my insurance company to lodge complaints on the terrible service they provided. Customer Service awful, their management awful. They left us high and dry with no direction and no help.

UPDATE: NEVER CONTACTED ME BACK. NEVER. What about all the other issues? 1. Lack of Communication 2. LACK of service 3. NO AVAILABLE THERAPISTS. You never offered us any other options or asked if we could pay out of pocket, or use our other insurance coverage of AETNA. What you can control is your employees. You have zero response to that. Either way stay away from this company, do your research. Check our previous employee reviews. I did not state I wanted to end services immediately. When you stated you did not know if your current therapist would be available, I stated I did NOT want a new person to come and cause MORE damage to my son. You guys are awful, stop trying to smooth it over. YOU NEVER CONTACTED ME again after July 11th. What a disgrace, can't even own up to your mistakes. Stop acting like this is our fault when you gave us nothing but...

I wish that we had the same positive experience the other reviewers had. Our son was diagnosed with autism and had no language at the time we reached out to Ascend Autism. We were told we were getting a BT "with experience" only to learn her only experience was working in a day care, not working with children on the spectrum. Our original BCBA was not very involved and wound up leaving the company shorty after being assigned to Ryan. We were then given a BCBA with a lot of experience and we were very hopeful our son would take off once she started working with our BT. Our BT was very kind and built a fast rapport with our son. However, she did not come with new ideas or strategies to help him. In the 6 months our son worked with Ascend Autism we cannot attribute any new skills or language to these therapists. There was no structured format to the sessions and this was frustrating to watch. When we decided to terminate the therapy, we thought the right thing to do was talk to the BT first since we thought we had established a good relationship with her. We thought there would be a process to ease out of the services and she said she would contact admin and get back to us. However, this was the last we heard from her. No response to texts or calls and didn't even say goodbye to our son. To say we are disappointed is an understatement. I hope other people have a better experience and my advice would be to speak directly to admin with issues or concerns...

We have been with Ascend for a year now and they have been the most amazing provider we have ever worked with. Our daughter Olivia has made so much progress with them! She was practically non-verbal when they started working with her and now she is able to communicate her needs. We have the best team working with our daughther. Our BCBA is very experienced, thoughtful and really involved. The BT that comes in every day to work with Olivia has been just wonderful. My daughter loves her and they have been very successful at implementing all the strategies and programs that my daughter needs to learn. I really believe that working with Ascend has made the biggest difference in terms of Olivia’s progress. I like that their sessions are play-based and they respect Olivia’s personality. I can only recommend...