I’ve tried 3 x VA Agencies in the last year and they were all rubbish. I almost ended up in litigation with the last one who claimed (wrongly) that I signed a 6 month contract without knowing it. My plan to find an agency VA to overcome anyone leaving was a disaster – with goodness knows who doing the work – so continuity went out the window either way.

It’s such a shame, as a few years ago I had two really good VAs but they went on to do other things. I’ve spent the best part of $1200 trying to find someone who can help. In the end, I’ve ended up doing the work myself.

To be fair to most Vas, their work like mine is a question of knowing when to advise and knowing when to follow. Most VAs don’t necessarily have brilliant sales skills, and their work can be erratic, so I don’t think it’s fair to calculate their income on working every single hour of every day – people do get sick you know and are you asking them not to attend a funeral?

I’m not sure that it’s fair to knock a VA for trying to improve themselves and raise their prices. My problem has simply been an issue with finding anyone who is willing to take on a small amount of work to begin with, so that I get a chance to see if we work well together. As an SME owner, I just can’t afford to keep chucking £100s at people only to end up doing the work myself.

Kind regards,
Stephen SL-Freelance

Lynn Terry
PO Box 7245
McMinnville TN 37111

Thanks! I hope your search for a new VA is successful. I do have a teleseminar that I did with Joan Stewart on “hiring a VA.” I have the CD of it and if anyone is interested, I’d be happy to send them a free copy of it. I also wanted to mention if you can think of anything else that I (or some of the VA Leaders) can do, let me know. Maybe talking about it can produce some results.

Thanks!

Diana Ennen

Thanks for your help. I’m interested in becoming a VA.

Michelle

If it is appropriate, could you pass my email along to the people that are VA’s that are responding to your blog. I’d like to correspond with them to decide if this is something I want to pursue.

Thanks for your help.

Good Thoughts Good Things,

Michelle

It can be really disheartening to start over again and again with someone new. I imagine a long term VA would be a huge asset to any business owner.

I’m hunting for that perfect match myself now. In fact, I just received an email reply from one VA that was highly recommended… so off I go

I follow your blog posts and was shocked to read your “not so great” experiences with VAs. I am a VA myself and have been for a few years. I love my work, I love my clients and I am passionate about what I do. Unfortunately, not all may feel the same.

I just wanted to comment and say that no matter what industry you are in, there will always be those who do not live up to their word, their standards and who compromise their work ethics for whatever reason that may be.

I do want you to know that there are great VAs out there. There are great VAs who not only live up to these standards, but become more to you than just an “administrative assistant”. There are VAs who value you and your business and truly see themselves as a business partner. They succeed when YOU succeed. I think that is where the distinction comes into place…