That's what happened to Marissa Ruiz, who supports her children on a social worker's salary. When she found herself struggling with more than $10,000 worth of credit card debt, she turned to a debt-settlement company for help.

After five months, Ruiz had handed over more than $600 in fees but her debt hadn't been reduced at all. She says that her creditors were getting more and more unhappy, harassing her more, threatening to garnish her check, and the whole process was getting worse instead of better.

Consumer Reports says some debt-settlement companies promise to help but can land people in even bigger trouble. A lot of the time, the company will tell you to stop paying your bills to build up some savings. But that makes your original debt grow as you miss payments and get hit with penalty fees and finance charges.

And that's not all. You'll also owe the company itself. That's because debt-reduction companies usually charge 15 percent of your total debt as an up-front fee, plus 20 percent if they reach a settlement.

Consumer Reports says a better option is to contact your creditors directly. It's possible to negotiate down the debt that you owe to a fraction of what it was before. In fact, bank officials that Consumer Reports talked to said they don't give any better deals to the debt companies than they do to individuals who call them up personally.

Another option is to go to debtadvice.org and look for a certified non-profit credit counselor through the National Foundation for Credit Counseling. Those counselors will help you either for free or for a set fee.