Introduction

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 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.

I am happy to chat through any questions you might have about my data protection policy and you can contact me via email hellospotoncounselling@gmail.com

‘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 Registration Number  ZB692738. My insurance provider is Holistic Service Insurance membership number HIS106394. 

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 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 or if you are in contact with me to consider therapy, 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 disclose 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 consent initially. I will then retain any counselling records in case of the need to reference them in the future (the official legal basis is to defend against potential legal claims).

How I use your information

Initial contact

When you contact me with an enquiry about my counselling services I will collect information to help me satisfy your enquiry. This will include:

• Name

• Age

• Address

• GP details

• Mobile phone number 

• Email address (generally for administrative communications)

• Session summary

• Reason for referral

Alternatively, your GP or other health professional may send me your details when making a referral.

If you decide not to proceed I will ensure all your personal data is deleted within one month.

While you are accessing Counselling

Rest assured that everything you discuss with me is confidential. That confidentiality will only be broken if:

• you pose a danger to yourself  or others.

• if you talk about money laundering or suspected terrorism  

• If there is suspected abuse or neglect of a child, elder, or dependent adult.

• If a court orders the release of information.

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 on a Practice management software company called Power Diary and are not shared with any third party.

I will keep written notes of each session, these are kept as above.

For security reasons I do not retain text messages or mails any longer than your time in counselling.

After counselling has ended

Once counselling has ended your records will be kept for seven years from the end of our contact and are then securely destroyed. 

Third party recipients of personal data

I use gmail to send my emails and these are encrypted by GMAIL by using Transport Layer Security (TLS)

Your rights

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 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 the request in writing addressing it to hellospotoncounselling@gmail.com.
  

• If you have any complaint about how I handle your personal data please do not hesitate to get in touch with me by writing or emailing to the contact details given above. I would 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 statutory body that oversees data protection law in the UK. For more information go to ico.org.uk/make-a-complaint.
  

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 is kept secure by laptops and computers requiring passwords which are regularly changed.

Website  

Like most websites I use cookies to help the site work more efficiently – find out  about the use of cookies on this site: https://automattic.com/cookies

No user specific data is collected by me or any third party. If you fill in a form on the  website, that data may be temporarily stored on the web host before being sent to me.

Therapeutic Will

Your name and contact details will be shared with my Therapeutic Executor, accessed by a special code, which electronically releases the name of anyone currently receiving therapy from myself, with their contact details, should the need arise to advise you of my death or incapacitation.

Last update: Oct 2024