Trust & confidentiality
Everything you share with me in our sessions is treated as confidential, and I will not discuss the content of our work with anyone outside of it, except in the specific circumstances described below.
As required by the BACP Ethical Framework, I have regular clinical supervision, where I discuss my work with a qualified supervisor. This is a requirement for all practising counsellors, and it exists to protect you as much as it protects me. My supervisor is also bound by confidentiality, and I never share anything that could identify you.
Limits to confidentiality
There are a small number of circumstances in which I may need to break confidentiality, and may not always be able to ask your consent first:
- If I believe that you, or someone else, are at serious risk of harm.
- If a child or vulnerable adult is at risk of harm or abuse.
- If you disclose involvement in, or knowledge of, an act of terrorism, money laundering or drug trafficking.
- If I am legally required to do so – for example, by a court order.
- In a lone-working emergency, if the police need to know who I was with.
Wherever possible, I will discuss this with you first, and involve you in what happens next.
Emergency contacts
I ask for the details of your GP and an emergency contact so that I can get help for you in an emergency. I would only contact them if I had a significant concern for your immediate safety – for example, if I believed you were at real and imminent risk of suicide or serious self-harm, or if I could not reach you and was seriously worried for your safety.
Your privacy & data
I take my responsibilities under UK data protection law (the UK GDPR and the Data Protection Act 2018) seriously. I keep only the minimum information needed to provide you with a safe and effective service: your contact details, brief session notes and the information on our written agreement.
- Information about your mental health is classed as “special category” data. I hold it to provide your counselling, under my professional duty of confidentiality.
- Notes are stored securely and are not shared except in the circumstances described on this page.
- I keep client records for 7 years after our work together ends, in line with the requirements of my professional insurance, after which they are securely destroyed.
- You have the right to ask what information I hold about you, to request a copy of it, and to ask me to correct anything inaccurate.
- I am registered with the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO), registration number ZC260898. If you have concerns about how your data is handled, you can contact the ICO at ico.org.uk.
When you contact me
If you get in touch by phone, WhatsApp or email, I use your details only to reply to you and to arrange counselling. I never share them or use them for marketing.
If I am suddenly unable to work
As recommended by the BACP, I have a professional executor – a registered mental health nurse bound by professional confidentiality – who would let you know if I were suddenly unable to work through serious illness or death. They would not provide counselling or discuss our work, and would keep records secure until they are due to be destroyed.
Boundaries
To protect our therapeutic relationship, I don’t add clients on personal social media or accept friend requests.
Professional standards & complaints
I work within the BACP’s Ethical Framework for the Counselling Professions and hold professional indemnity insurance and an enhanced DBS check. If you are ever unhappy with any aspect of our work together, please tell me directly in the first instance – I would always rather know. If we are unable to resolve things between us, you are entitled to contact the BACP at bacp.co.uk.
Service checked
Reg. ZC260898
& public liability