Fees, Insurance, Professional Standards & Privacy

Fees

Counselling - £50 (adults - 60 minutes)

Counselling - £40 (children/young people - 45 minutes)

Supervision - £65 (90 minutes)

EMDR therapy - £65 (90 minutes)

Insurance

I have professional Civil Liability insurance through Howden

Professional Standards

I have an enhanced DBS check for adults and children and I am an accredited member of the British Association of Counselling & Psychotherapy

Privacy

The General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) is concerned with your personal information and how it is collected, stored and shared. This statement outlines how I collect, store and share information about you.

At the point that you get in touch with me to discuss or request counselling or supervision services, I collect information about you. This may come from my web contact form or during an email or telephonic discussion. The information that I collect may be one of the following:

Counselling - I may ask to take information such as your name, date of birth, email address, telephone contact numbers, occupation, what kind of counselling you are looking for and the background to this, your coping strategies and any mental health or previous therapy history, emergency contact name and number, medical history and any medication you take, your GP’s name and number (I will always aim to seek consent to contact a GP before doing so)

Supervision - I may ask to take your name, email address, telephone contact numbers, college/university details (if applicable), occupation, emergency contact name and number

On my website www.thelisteninglane.com you will be informed of the use of cookies which give you a better quality of experience when accessing my internet pages.

I follow the BACP Ethical Framework and am registered with the ICO to provide assurance that your information is collected and held safely and ethically.

I keep records of all appointments (counselling and supervision) and make brief notes after each session. Notes are anonymised and protected by a code based system that only I have access to.

In the case where you request a report or letter (e.g. to solicitors, Court of Law, medical insurance company, your employer etc.) you will see the material before it is shared and will be given the opportunity to have detail omitted.

Any written documentation, records or material are held in a locked cabinet and held for up to 7 years. Thereafter they are safely disposed of.

How I store your personal information

Paper notes that I record after every session
Telephone: I store only your initials and contact number in my mobile phone
SMS: If you consent to SMS communication, I will only use your first initial in messages
eMail: I used gmail for general correspondence such as organising sessions which means your email address will be stored in my email account. For email therapy we will both use an email system that is secured with full end-to-end encryption called ProtonMail
Electronically: all paperwork is password protected and when printed out stored in a lockable cabinet that only I have access to
Website: I do not store any of your personal details on my website

Sharing information without your consent

As outlined above I will ask you for your consent to take your GP’s name and contact details and in most cases seek further consent from you if I feel it would be helpful to contact them.

In cases where there is reason to believe you are a serious risk to yourself or someone else, or there are issues relating to child protection, I am required by law to take action. In this situation I am obliged to breach confidentiality by contacting your emergency contact, a crisis team, your GP, the police or child protection services. I will always aim to discuss this with you first if it is possible.

In the unlikely event that I encounter an emergency personally and am unable to contact you directly, I may give your first name and contact details to a trusted person so they may make you aware that I am unable to hold our session (counselling or supervision). No further information or details will be shared with that trusted person, or anything about you discussed other than the requirement to cancel a pre-agreed meeting. I will then get back in touch with you myself at the earliest opportunity to reschedule.

At the point that we enter into a counselling or supervision agreement, you are agreeing to the points outlined in this GDPR statement. We can discuss any particular sections you are unsure of.

We will both sign a counselling or supervision agreement to acknowledge this.

Complaints

I would hope that we can address any problems or disruption together and that we will build a fruitful alliance that allows us to do this. However, in the case where you feel you wish to make a formal complaint, this should be placed with the BACP, details on how to do this can be found here => https://www.bacp.co.uk/about-us/protecting-the-public/professional-conduct/how-to-complain-about-a-bacp-member/