Samaritans Reviews 

What are waste of space this organization is very few far between people actually want to help on Samaritans I think a lot of them are just there to say they are Samaritan but don't really care about people that they're talking to this is my personal opinion nobody has to listen

Spoke to a lady (and I say that lightly)who straight off bat become abusive. I was belittled and made to feel how disgusting I am. She then started shouting at me saying that human trafficking does not exist, then promptly hung up. I then rang to make a complaint. Not to long after a woman rang me about my complaint. My 14 year old child was then with me at the time. She was then asked why my child wasn’t at school. I then started to explain that my child had a doctors appointment because of issues with painful joints and bones which my doctor is trying to get to the bottom of. I now regret telling her about my child as I don’t know what that has anything to do with anything. So if you want to feel like your in an episode of black mirror then the Samaritans are place to ring!

I rang Samaritans in Northampton roughly around 1am/1.30am into Saturday the 18th of May 2025. My head was full and I had served anxiety. I tried to engage/ talk with a female helper, Who sounded like she was in her late 40s/50s. She did not talk to me, her tone was rude. Didn't say who she was, and didn't asked for my name. During the conversation I was having with myself. The lady just went umm , occasionally throughout the conversation. She then ended the call abruptly herself, by saying do you feel better yet?. While I was still talking. Like I was disturbing her from painting her nails 💅 or reading a magazine, she sounded bored and was rude from the moment she answered my call...After not listening to a word I was saying. I said yes, with that, the lady put the phone down. I felt so stupid for ringing, and never will again. For a lady to just say umm occasionally through out the call and nothing else. I felt like I had bored her. She gave no advice and made it clear she was not listening. But to cut me off when I have never rang this service before, for help made me feel ten times worse, than I did before. For that lady to say, while I was talking. " Right do you think you feel better now" ?. I just said yes, knowing and feeling even more unwelcome on the phone. With that the lady didn't say goodbye or anything, and I didn't get a chance to in return. As she put the phone down. How this lady left me feeling for the rest of night, was awful, her attitude was bad, un-interested. I will never ring the service again. This has really put me of from seeking help from any telephone service. Regards. Ps' I'm female, regardless of the name I'm under....If I cld I wld not of given this lady/ the service, a star ⭐... Awful attitude 😔. Yet mental health service's are becoming harder to find...with all the government cuts, waiting lists etc...

What I don't get is why the Samaritans is on top everyone's list suggesting the Samaritans and they cannot even answer the phone? and if for any reason the Samaritans were short of stuff, how on earth they would not call back like anyone gets a missed call on their phones??!!! Rotten entity.

A lot of people, for various genuine reasons, prefer to talk to female volunteers and there just aren’t enough of them available to talk to at night. It can take several tries at 3 am to get through to a female voice, after a string of male ones, and the wait-times for any one call are already naturally protracted at that time.

I feel like anyone who calls the samaritans isn't in a good way, myself included. I was actually on the verge of suicide.

I called and I spoke to Andy. I was suicidal before I called. The patience and empathy these guys have in incredible. I told Andy a whole host of problems I was having, however, the calm understanding advice he had for me was literally life changing. He sat on the phone with me for an hour while I cried, laughed, and pondered.

While I mentally kept bringing myself down, Andy brought me back up. I never made it easy, as anyone in my position would do. Andy, thank you.

I just wanted to talk about my one and only good experience with samaritans. the lady, Helen, spoke to me very gently and made me feel very held and listened to. I've had plenty of bad experiences with samaritans in the past, but if Helen is reading this, I just want her to know she really helped me feel calm tonight. thankyou darling.

Disgusting. I’ve been dealing with severe anxiety and depression for multiple years and I would call Samaritans because they helped me when I would hyperventilate. I recently tried to ring them to find out my number has been blocked. Do you know how disgusting that is? Your a 24/7 emotional support line that quite frankly doesn’t offer support. You just sit there listen then say you’ve been on the phone to long. You lot really need to consider changing your approach and actually get some younger people in because these OAP’s that you lot hsve and very inconsiderate. Honestly f this service i don’t advise to anybody.

I contacted samaritans to get support over my depression and low self esteem that I have and am going through and like everyone else within 10 minutes of the call the talk ended with no support provided

Never will ring samaritans again as most of the volunteers are narcissistics gaslighting you and patronising you and only doing it for there own ego boost to make them look good and ive had volunteers slamming the phone down on me they said there is other callers i was in the middle of speaking while that was said rude should be focussed on the caller not on the next call and you wouldnt believe me if i told you what a volunteer said while i was ODing i wanted to take more she said well you should of took more in the first place then it would of worked i was shocked and took back that she was encouraging me no empathy not fit for purpose suprised samaritans is still going with the amount of bad narcisstic volunteers as theyll pull it down then the good volunteers dont get noticed

Absolutely useless, took over 10 mins to answer my call for help and by then I'm ready to smash my hand and head up, thank you for your support, what a waste of time

Just tried opening up explaining what my problems were but he couldn't wait to finish the phone call and made me feel very uncomfortable like he didn't really want to listen or care and felt it was a waste of time,it was really hard fr me to reach out too I hope noone else has to suffer the same way.

I needed to talk and be heard. That's exactly what I got. Thank you David. 5* I will definitely be signposting others to this service.

New volunteers expected to do all kinds of days and hours, and at least 3 hrs a week with at least 1 overnight shift every 3 months. This is incompatible with those who have children to care for and also work full time. Even those who don't have kids and work full time have difficulty managing this. This skews the listener volunteer demographic to mainly middle class retirees with cars, own homes, few financial worries, out of touch/can't relate with the current state of social services, government agencies and working class people problems. They do this for an ego boost, only work hours that are comfortable for them, leaving unsocial hours to new or a few very committed volunteers.

Majority of callers are lonely older people who don't work and aren't close to their families for various reasons; lonely people who have difficulties socialising for various reasons; angry people shouting down the phone being belligerent/sarcastic about the volunteer's inability to solve their money/housing/job/relationship problems for them. Female volunteers get a lot of male sex pests calling up to masturbate to fantasies about sex involving rape and children. A lot of prisoners call as well and when they encounter female listeners, a large proportion of them want to talk about sex. Female volunteers are encouraged to "explore feelings" with these men because they must have been "traumatised" to act this way. Samaritans callers are now routed nationally across UK and Ireland so get a fair few callers with thick accents that are very challenging to make sense of, making it difficult to understand/converse/"help" them. Very rarely are there truly suicide calls, but many bored/lonely regular callers will claim to be suicidal to keep the volunteer on the line.

Deteriorating NHS services mean that more callers with serious mental health issues are redirected to Samaritans whenever NHS mental services are closed/overwhelmed. Many callers are in the midst of a serious mental health crisis - upset/angry, psychotic, incoherent callers blaming the world for their ills, threatening to do something violent to whomever is living with them to "fix" their issues. Samaritans can do nothing unless caller gives address+name, which never happens as callers are often paranoid about police/doctors.

The in-house training is 6 weeks of group classes using standardised teaching material from Samaritans HQ which teaches the "listening wheel" and the stepped approach to discussing suicide with callers. After group class training, training is then conducted 1:1 by so-called "mentors" - mostly old-timers in the branch who listen in on conversations new volunteers take, telling them what to say. Caller numbers are auto-logged by HQ. Any personal details given by callers are stored in HQ servers too. Zero consistency in how mentors teach because they were trained ages ago, answering phones in their own way. It's all very vague - basically if a trainee gells well with their mentor and don't question the flaws in the system, then he/she will be approved as a volunteer. There are branch politics/unspoken hierarchy/cliques - everyone keeps quiet about bullying/makes snide remarks - the only solution is for the person picked on to resign. Some volunteers seem to weirdly derive pleasure when sharing callers' sexual/relationship problems to other volunteers (and whomever).

It's all very superficial. Samaritans are taught to never give advice; never disclose anything, i.e. never agree with the caller on any opinion/preference, even if they did. While old-timers get away with saying what they like, new Samaritans are chastised if conversations aren't focused only on caller's "feelings" - no "chatting" with callers about anything else - must allow more silences so "callers can talk more". All this can result in a cold, unempathic, unnatural conversation style. Few people who aren't trained counsellors can talk like this without sounding stunted and unemotional. Doesn't suit callers who aren't "talkers", and not effective either for callers in acute states of psychosis wanting to do something violent, which are all typical calls that Samaritans get. The Samaritans approach uses aspects of Carl Roger's Person-Centred therapy but can't build long term relationships with callers to help them improve/change their lives. The irony is they want unpaid volunteers. If they'll only hire and pay trained counsellors, the service quality could be improved.

Campaign for a better NHS, social services, government, etc. that make a difference. Not this. This is a vain attempt to show donors they’re doing “something”. Every Conservative’s wet dream is to defund public services and direct everyone affected to the Samaritans.

It says to call anytime day or night. I called 3x at 3am and no answer. I was in my darkest of times. Aren't these supposed to be available for you?

If you’re even lucky to get someone

I hate using the services because they’re pointless and they don’t do anything. But when you feel low you don’t have a choice,

I tried the online one and sat there waiting for somebody to join the chat. The estimated time was five minutes which was actually more like 15 but when this person did arrive, all they said was I will say bye-bye and then give the chat.

Yeah, mental health means nothing to , Companies use it as a way to make themselves look good Every year for a week they put posters up, saying mental health matters open up

Truth is, she’s just a burn to society and nobody really cares whether you here or not, If you stay, you pay taxes For everybody else and get nothing out of society If you die, somebody else just takes over

Mental health You do alone

I have just had a very bad experience with 'a listener'.
I have given them two chances now and each time I have received the same respoinse, not interested, patronising and intimates the problem is yours and yours alone. Do not bother to phone these people.

I have just had a call with Michael from Samaritans and I was really struggling but he seemed genuinely happy to be speaking to me and didn’t judge me at all, this brung me back to reality and I’m really happy that we have good people like this in the world to help us in hard times.

I DON’T SAY THIS LIGHLTY BUT IT’S THE WORST MANGERED SHOPS I HAVE EVER COME ACROSS AND I WILL NEVER VOLUNTEER DUE TO THE TRUAMA AND NEGECT THAT COMPANY HAS CAUSED!
As of today (11th march) my husband has left with immediate effect and they came across as uncaring and handed a letter which we hope they will follow what they said about payment he has been bullied by another assistant manager who also made a threat of if he touched one of her displays, she would hurt him and when complaints were put In, they did nothing and blamed him. He has tried to communicate with the other assistant manager but was then accused of harassment when I also put in complaints, I also got accused of things I didn’t do and no proof was provided. My husband has been silenced and because he sent a truthful email to all volunteers and why he had to leave the main manager who refuses to listen to staff and volunteers he then sent an email to all volunteers blaming him. We will not be silenced or lie about how bad our experiences got after the mangers passing and how poorly this business is run. They would rather let go of loyal staff and volunteers instead of listening to feedback. The assistant manager has been a bully and has pushed my husband out of work and have ruined his health. I would honestly not support this charity. It’s a shame to say it has gone down hill ever since the manger passed away since the new one took over, he's uncaring with no compassion. As such we are left with no other option but to publicly display our grievances, as complaints and meetings have gone nowhere.
I had to leave after the manager took his own life and since the other took over he refuses to do anything about complaints. one assistant manager made it a toxic environment to be in. i have put in complaints to then be accused of things i haven't done and when i asked for polices on conflict of interest and proof of accusations they have gave me nothing but the other assistant manager is allowed to have her house mate volunteer along side her. so they made one rule and didnt enforces it on other people who live together. they would rather give a poor services and not look after their own staff. for a company to claim they listen and help they defiantly don't do that but if you put in complaints you wont get anywhere. they have also been letting a dog run around the shop and when the volunteers have said they have allergies the main manager will not do anything but it they let assistant manager do what she wants. may i add that may husband was with this charity for 6 yrs and myself for 1 yrs.

Wasn’t sure whether to give 3 or 4 stars to be fair. I called before in 2022, it did help. I was almost ready to finish the conversation. I just needed just a few minutes more. They ended it just a little abruptly. My only complaint for that time. If it was just eased up. I’m not sure how. It’s not really my job to know how. Someone said they felt like they’d woken someone from their sleep. Kind of how I felt this time. I’m of course I wouldn’t want an over the top, hyper response lol, just a LITTLE bit more life, only a little bit. Honestly it sounded like they’ve given up. If someone is calling, they’ve most likely given up, I think it might help if they’re not greeted by someone who sounds like they have. There IS. WARMTH with them. KEEP THAT WARMTH PLEASE!! When giving a 1-2star review. You’ve written, “What went wrong this time?” Umm, maybe take way the words, ‘this time’. A simple, ‘what went wrong?’ Is sufficient & to the point. Yous don’t come off like yous are taking umbridge to any critique & suggestions on how to improve & I don’t think yous are looking to come off like yous take criticisms, or possible suggestions for improvement personally. I hope this helps. I do appreciate the service you provide.