[PollyG]

I have a friend that has waited almost 2 years for a referral of a young/infant girl (up to 2 years old) from Russia. Her agency is not accreditied and now that she is at the "top" of their referral list, they have only offered her referrals of much older children way out of her criteria. She is considering changing agencies (I recommended she go with an accredited one) but she is afraid she will have to start over at the bottom of an agency's referral list and it could be one or two years more of waiting. She is very discouraged and wonders if she should even continue. What are the wait times people are having now from signing with an agency and getting an actual referral? Are there any agencies that are processing adoptions fairly quickly?

[loricalla]

have a friend that has waited almost 2 years for a referral of a young/infant girl (up to 2 years old) from Russia. Her agency is not accreditied

Polly,

I thought the agency had to be accredited to work with Russia. In my case, we are working with an agency who is not accredited, but who partners with one who is. Maybe that is your friend's situation as well. At any rate, 2 years is much longer than anything I've heard.

Lori

[amanda_p]

We waited 1 1/2 yrs for an infant girl and switched agencies and 5 months later we were home with our daughter. We just came home with her in Dec 07. I strongly suggest your friend look at other agencies. We were scared to death to switch and lose all the money that we had given the 1st agency but it truely worked out for us!!! PM me if you need agency info.

[cathvash]

Sadly, it does little good to be at the top of someone's list, if they are processing "0" adoptions each month...

I guess it might be helpful for her/you to post a question here or on another site, asking for pm related to this agency - what are folks hearing/being told about the delay for this agency? This is important, because it is likely the agency is in the group of around half that are still without Accreditation. The MOE historically only approves a few each month or two. So if there are 30 agencies waiting, it makes a big difference for her decision as to whether this agency is being told they are in the "next batch" for approval or not. Perhaps they already have all of the required signatures and are only awaiting the MOE to catch up, so they'll be "moving" within a month or two. OR perhaps they have hit a snag with one of the Ministries, and the documents are held there until the problem can be fixed (They must have ALL of the signatures before the MOE will even review their documents). The difference could be a year or more between when these agencies receive their accreditation. It is certainly worthwhile to see what people are hearing...

It's a tough situation. After getting as much information as possible about "where" the agency is in the Accreditation process, perhaps your friend should set a "deadline" for how long she's willing to wait before moving to another agency. Best wishes to her!!