Verbal Tutors in the Bay Area

My company has plenty of great tutors, but I've got an obvious conflict of interest in recommending them, so let me instead talk about how you should choose a tutor (regardless of what company s/he works for).

I thought I already posted this info somewhere on BTG, but I can't find it when I search for it, so I'll put it in here again!

You should have access to a bio or other information that will let you know the tutor's experience before you officially agree to the tutoring (in other words, you should be able to check the person out and decline to work with that tutor if you don't want to for any reason).

You should have an email or phone conversation with the tutor before you officially meet for a paid tutoring session, and the tutor should give you some kind of work to do before the first meeting (I personally ask my new students to take an MGMAT practice test with 2 weeks of our first session; they then have to email me after they've taken it so I can go in and look at their results before we meet).

Your tutor should ask you enough questions to know your situation to a certain extent: how long have you been studying? what have you done so far? what do you think your strengths and weaknesses are? what is your goal score? when do you want to take the test? do you have any deadlines you have to meet? (These questions might come before the first session or at the first session - the point is, the tutor should be developing a strategy for your specific situation, not just applying a one-size-fits-all approach.)

You and your tutor should set up a general game plan at the first meeting: what your goals are and the general plan for how to accomplish that, including what you'll do on your own, how often you'll meet, etc. this game plan then gets adjusted over time based on where you are and aren't improving.