Privacy Policy
Your privacy is very important to me and you can be confident that your personal information will be kept safe and secure and will only be used for the purpose it was given to me. I adhere to the current data protection legislation, including the General Data Protection Regulation (EU/2016/679) (The GDPR), the Data Protection Act 2018 and the Privacy and Electronic Communications (EC Directive) Regulations 2003.
This privacy notice tells you what I will do with your personal information from initial point of contact through to after your therapy has ended, including:
Why I am able to process your information and what purpose I am processing it for
Whether you have to provide it to me
How long I store it for
Whether there are other recipients of your personal information
Whether I intend to transfer it to any other country
Whether I do automated decision-making or profiling, and
Your data protection rights
I am happy to chat through any questions you might have about my data protection policy and you can contact me via email.
‘Data Controller’ is the term used to describe the person / organisation that collects and stores and has responsibility for people’s personal data. In this instance, the data controller is me.
I am registered with the Information Commissioner’s Office (C1989482).
My lawful basis for holding and using your personal information
The GDPR states that I must have a lawful basis for processing your personal data. There are different lawful bases depending on the stage at which I am processing your data. I have explained these below:
If you have had therapy or any other support with me and it has now ended, I will use legitimate interest as my lawful basis for holding and using your personal information.
If you are currently having therapy / support or if you are in contact with me to consider therapy / support, I will process your personal data where it is necessary for the performance of our contract.
The GDPR also makes sure that I look after any sensitive personal information that you may disclosed to me appropriately. This type of information is called ‘special category personal information’. The lawful basis for me processing any special categories of personal information is that it is for provision of treatment or support and necessary for a contract with a professional (in this case, a contract between me and you).
How I use your information
Initial contact
When you contact me with an enquiry about my services, I will collect information to help me satisfy your enquiry. This will include your contract details and your reasons for getting in touch. Alternatively, somebody else might send me your details when making a referral, or a trusted individual may give me your details when making an enquiry on your behalf.
If you decide not to proceed, I will ensure all your personal data is deleted within one month. If you would like me to delete this information sooner, please let me know.
While you are accessing services
Rest assured that everything you discuss with me is confidential. That confidentiality will only be broken if there is a risk of serious harm to you or somebody else, or if you disclose serious crime. I will always try to speak to you about this first unless there are safeguarding issues that prevent this.
I will keep a record of your personal details to help the counselling services run smoothly. These details are kept securely in a password-protected laptop, using password-protected software, and are not shared with any third party.
I will keep written notes of each session. These are kept on a secure platform.
For security reasons I do not retain text messages for more than six months. If there is relevant information stored in a text message I will copy the message into my case notes. Likewise, any correspondence will be deleted after six monthsif it is not important. If necessary, I will copy relevant information into case notes.
After counselling has ended
Once counselling or support has ended your records will be kept for one year from the end of our contact with each other and then securely destroyed. If you want me to delete your information sooner, please tell me.
Third party recipients of personal data
I sometimes share personal data with third parties, for example where I have contracted with a supplier to carry out specific tasks. In such cases I have carefully selected which partners I work with. I take great care to ensure that I have a contract with the third party that states what they are allowed to do with the data I share with them. I ensure that they do not use your information in any way other than the task for which they have been contracted.
HubSpot
Zanda Health
Your rights
I try to be as open as I can be in terms of giving people access to their personal information. You have a right to ask me to delete your personal information, to limit how I use your personal information, or to stop processing your personal information. You also have a right to ask for a copy of any information that I hold about your and to object to the use of your personal data in some circumstances. You can read more about your rights at ico.org.uk/your-data-matters
If I do hold information about you I will:
Give you a description of it and where it came from;
Tell you why I am holding it, tell you how long I will store your data for and how I made this decision;
Tell you who it could be disclosed to;
Let you have a copy of the information in an intelligible form.
You can also ask me at any time to correct any mistakes there may be in the personal information I hold about you.
To make a request for any personal information I may hold about you, please put a request in writing via email.
If you have any complaints about how I handle your personal data please do not hesitate to get in touch with me by writing or emailing on the contact details listed on my website. Wi ould welcome any suggestions for improving my data protection procedures.
If you want to make a formal complaint about the way I have processed your personal information you can contact the ICO which is the stator body that oversees data protection law in the UK. For more information go to ico.org.uk/make-a-compliant
Data security
I take the security of the data I hold about you very seriously and as such I take every effort to make sure it’s kept secure. I only store information in electronic format, and this is stored on a password-protected laptop, and on password-protected, device-based software.
Visitors to my website
When someone visits my website, I use a third party service (Squarespace) to collect standard internet log information and details of visitor and behaviour patterns. I do this to find out things such as the number of visitors to the various parts of the site. This information is only processed in a way that does not identify anyone. I do not make, and do not allow Squarespace to make, any attempt to find out the identities of those visiting my website.
I use legitimate interests as my lawful basis for holding and using your personal information in this way when you visit my website.
I use Squarespace so I can continually improve my service to you.
Like most website, we use cookies to help the site work more efficiently.
No user-specific data is collected by me or any third party. If you fill in a form on my website, that data will be temporarily stored on the web host before being sent to me.