A credit card is something many people own, and use. However, incorrect usage of credit cards will bring you more harm, than benefit. It is important that you make your monthly payments to the credit card company on time, so that your installments don’t accumulate into a massive debt amount. The same can be said about any loans you have; you have to make sure that you make your payments in time, lest your installments accumulate into a massive debt amount. This debt proves to be rather tedious to you mentally, and financially.When in debt, you will have to listen to harassments from creditors, and sometimes even threats from them. So in a move to step down from all this, one usually opts for some form of debt consolidation. With a debt consolidation loan, the debt consolidation company that you approach will send over a representative to you to assess your financial and debt problems. Once he gets an idea of the extent of debt you are in, he approaches your creditors to negotiate for a lower interest rate, and lowered balance amount. In fact, the more experienced advisor is capable of eliminating your interest rate too.Once the loan amounts and interest rates are determined, the debt consolidation services allot you a debt consolidation loan, where you have to make monthly payments. These monthly payments are generally lower than the payments you had to make previous to the debt consolidation loan. another benefit of a debt consolidation loan is that you don’t have to make multiple payments to your various creditors. You just have to make a single payment to the debt consolidation company, and it is the job of the debt consolidation company to make payments to your creditors. So you are relieved of the stress of paying your creditors every month.When looking for the right debt consolidation loan, you find that there are many debt consolidation services available. Some of them advertise them as free debt consolidation services. However, these debt consolidation services are not always free, but their fees, if any, are usually much lower than the fees from a for-profit debt consolidation company. The debt consolidation company that functions for a profit usually charges its clients a flat fee every month. They also have competitive, additional charges over these fees. However, the free and non-profit debt consolidation companies generally only charge monthly fees, if any. They receive funding from other sources and creditors, for the functioning of the debt consolidation company. This means that you will eventually receive lower rates, and monthly installments from these debt consolidation services.These free debt consolidation services offer other services besides debt consolidation loans. They also offer credit counseling agencies that help people get their credit under control. It is the people with a poor or bad credit that prefers the services of free debt consolidation companies as they receive money from creditors for running their service, and don’t have to depend on the payments of their clients.However, the for-profit companies prefer working with clients having good credit as they feel that they are more likely to receive payments from these clients. Though the free debt consolidation company proves to be a better choice, there is always the fear of a scam company; this is why it is better to do some research before deciding on the right debt consolidation company to clear your debt with.