Accion San Diego

When we were first introduced to Accion, we were but humble entrepreneur newbies. Nobody would rent us a DVD, let alone give us a small business loan. And rightly so, we were in business for less than two years and had a little bit of revenue to show for it, but certainly not anything spectacular.
From the minute we met Juan Carlos and Rebecca, we were in good, nay great hands. They believed in us and fought for us. They went to bat for us when no one else would. And they held our hands through the entire process, even pushing us along when we fell off. They fought for us to get a loan through their program.
The short story is, Accion provided us with our first money that didn’t come from family and friends. And it made all of the difference when it happened. Since then, we’ve grown tremendously. In fact, we came back to Accion almost two years later with more sales on our side and applied for a second loan. Again, Juan Carlos and Rebecca were there for us and helped us speedily get a new loan and grow even more.
In addition to loans, Accion has been helpful in promoting our company throughout their network in San Diego and even nationally.
We couldn’t be happier with everything Accion has helped us with. We wouldn’t be here without them. And we would whole-​heartedly recommend them to anyone in search of funding for a small business.
Thank you Accion!

Accion came through for me and my business when all other loan options failed me. As a start up business it is almost impossible to get funding from any bank. Accion took the time to work with me, look at the projections I had for the business, and looked outside of the box at the whole picture of the business. Damaris was very helpful as I worked through the loan application process, and Rebecca walked me through each step and helped to assist in any way possible to get the loan approved. Rosalinda came in person to my business to meet me, sign the documents and fund my business. It is because of Accion that my business is going to not only survive, but thrive! Thank you to Accion for making the impossible possible!

UPDATE: Yes, it’s true that I spoke with the CEO of Accion, and I had the chance to talk about some of the problems with Accion. However, Juan Carlos Hernandez most certainly DID NOT reach out to me personally regarding this review. I want to be super clear about what’s happening because Juan Carlos Hernandez seems to have no problems making false statements on Unilocal to try to salvage Accion’s reputation. Not that it matters, because I’m done dealing with Accion, as I said above, I’ve paid off my loan completely (and never missed a payment). You know what’s funny? No one at Accion has EVER wanted to talk to me so badly as they did after seeing my review!
Well since I’m not about to let Juan Carlos Hernandez get the last word on this subject, let me tell you about some of the problems I’ve had with Accion in greater detail:
1) On one occasion, Accion brought a local politician to our office for a little «meet-​and-​greet». This was great, except for one thing: this person utilized my business’ services FOR FREE! This is what Accion brings to your business: entitled cronies that’ll apparently abuse their power and connections for their own personal gain.
2) Another time some folks from Accion came by our office to take a few promotional pictures. Which was really cool! UNTIL their employees starting talking among themselves to figure out which one of them was going to be the one to utilize our services for free that day! I’m told they’re not supposed to do this, but hey, that didn’t stop them from trying.
Does anyone really believe that Accion cares about the success of their clients when they’re sending people to these businesses expecting free stuff?
And this is just the tip of the iceberg. If Juan Carlos Hernandez replies, I’ll tell more stories about Accion. Let’s see if he can keep his comments to himself this time!

This is gonna be a long review as I really want to paint the picture for you all of my experience with Accion in hopes the this company will get there Customer Service game together!
The bottom line:
Do not believe that you are getting a loan from them until the deal is done and the check is cashed. Also, when they rush you for all your info and you find yourself scrambling to get everything they are asking for because they are telling you they can have it to you by tomorrow, STOP! and have the process be on YOUR terms!
If you are going to apply, go for it, but if you were told, like I was that they help «just about anyone» since they are a non profit organization, don’t buy into it, just treat it them like you would a bank or any other lender.
The Story:
First, I am a big believer in taking responsibility for your self and your life. Certainly, when you find yourself in less than desirable situations it is wisest to at least take a look at yourself and see where you may have contributed, what you can learn from it all, then comes accountability. I am not saying they were wrong in denying my loan, in fact I learned a lot about a lot of things in this process… BUT THEY COULD HAVE DONE A WAY BETTER JOB OF IN THEIR CUSTOMER SERVICE.
Here is what happened:
–Applied on-​line mid month December
–Got a voice mail from someone a week or two later
–Called them back, left a voice mail
–Got a voice mail from them saying «This is my second attempt to contact you!»
— Left them another voice mail, saying «Hey, I left you a voice mail, did you get it? Oh, and here is my email address, in case its better for us to make an appointment to talk since we are playing phone tag».
–No Call BackNo Email response
— Went to a BANK to see if I qualified for a loan for the same amount there. They declined and referred me to ACCION. Gave me a business card of a different person than the one I had been calling. I thought, hey I’ll give it a try.
— Called person on Business Card and left voice mail saying that I had been playing phone tag with someone from their company, and regardless would like to talk with them regarding my application.
–Two days later got a call from different person calling on behalf of the person on the business card… she then connects me to the original person I had played phone tag with.
— Talk with original person handling my application and she says «I WAS JUST ABOUT TO DELETE YOUR APPLICATION SINCE WE HAD NOT SPOKEN» I was like «What? Did you get my messages?»
She said’ «Oh ya I got one of them, but I left early one day because it was raining so much»…
FOR THOSE OF YOU WHO ARE ALREADY RAISING AN EYEBROW, YES, IT GETS BETTER
–She goes on to tell me that the loan looks good we just need info from you, she did pull my credit and asked that I pay something OFF that was in collections (Which I Did, it was a small enough amount that it made sense to do). I get her the rest of this info, documents etc. It takes me a couple days to get it all but all through I“m thinking «Hey, its worth it. She says the loan looks like it could go through». Awesome!
— She sends it to Underwriting. Underwriting calls me a day or two later, in the morning. I am out running errands so I let it go to voice mail and figure I’ll call them back when I get home so I can give them my full attention.
–20MINUTES later she calls again! I pick up even though I am in the car, on my way home. I tell her, I’m in the car but I can chat for a few minutes. Then it’s the whole interview, Can you send me this, I need this pay stub, what about his equipment… on and on with the questions… but she sounds totally enthusiastic, and she is saying «Hey I want to get this done today, so you can come in tomorrow and we can get this done, otherwise its gonna be next week». (Tomorrow being a two and a half hour trip to get to them).
— I change my WHOLE DAY AROUND to get her what she needs, I start calling people, calling my work for records, calling my supplier for my business… I cancel my appointments for the next day thinking I am going to head to there office to sign paper work and pick up a check.
— 1 hour later SHE CALLS AGAIN, I’m in an appointment she leaves a voice mail.“Hey turns out I don’t need all the other stuff can you just send me the pay stubs?”
— 30 minutes later SHE CALLS AGAIN, and says «I turned it into my loan officer and we just think you have to many expenses, and we can’t tell for sure they are business expenses, and we don’t want you in over your head. You know, We all like our nice designer coffees, but I think what we are looking for is a lifestyle».
She’s right, I spend way too much on Starbucks, I would have happily disclosed that up front, AND you answer for yourself Did they really have to put me through all of that just to tell me that I spent too much money on coffee? Did they have to give this positive happy impression and tell me they want the loan done by tomorrow such that I would move my whole day around?

Since, I have changed my mind about accion, they have help me get to where I can get started with my business that better than any banks, I have tried to work with. I think people with low income or doesn’t have the money in pocket to start a business get ignored. I have work with Juan Carlos at accion, I like to say he really help me out, now I can take it from here. Thank you Juan Carlos and people at accion.

With Accion, my partner and I were able to get the start up funding we needed to get our new business off the ground. Our loan officer, Rosalinda, went above and beyond to answer all of my questions throughout the process. Thanks to all of her hard work and attention to detail, we were approved for the full requested amount! We couldn’t have asked for a better experience.

When banks, credit unions, everyone turned us down for temporary bridging loans, Accion came through and rather than just knee-​jerk decline, actually LOOKED at our numbers, our projections and gave us a loan that should ensure our survival and ultimate success. All this was done with courtesy and dignity by Rosalinda and her team.
Highly recommended.