Your privacy is 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, 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 another 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 A8787306.  My phone number is: 07988424518. My email address is: jo@calmafterthestorm.co.uk

 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. 

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 that it is for provision of health treatment (in this case counselling) and necessary for a contract with a health 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 counselling, I will collect information to help me satisfy your enquiry. This will include phone number and email. If you decide not to proceed, I will ensure all your personal data is deleted within 2 months. If you would like me to delete this information sooner, just let me know.

 While you are accessing counselling: 

Everything you discuss with me is confidential. That confidentiality will only be broken if there is a legal requirement or there is an adult or child safeguarding concern. I will always try to speak to you about this first, unless there are safeguarding issues that prevent this. I adhere to the British Association of Counsellors and Psychotherapists Ethical Framework (2018) which includes guidance on confidentiality. 

I will keep a record of your personal details to help the counselling run smoothly. These details are kept securely in a password protected and encrypted hard drive and are not shared with any third party. Occasionally I keep written notes following a session, these are anonymised and kept in a locked storage or password protected encrypted hard drive. For security reasons I do not retain text messages for more than 3 months after you have finishing counselling. If there is relevant information contained in a text message, I will keep these on a password protected phone. Likewise, any email correspondence will be deleted 3 months after you have finished and during our counselling will be stored on a password protected encrypted device.

 After counselling has ended: 

Once counselling has ended your written records will be kept for 7 years from the end of our contact with each other and are then securely destroyed. If you want me to delete your information sooner than this, please let me know by email.

 Your rights 

You have a right to ask for a copy of any information that I hold about you and to ask me to delete your personal information, to limit how I use your personal information, or 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.

 To make a request for any personal information I may hold about you, please put the request in writing addressing it to jo@calmafterthestorm.co.uk

If you have any complaint about how I handle your personal data please do not hesitate to get in touch with me by emailing to the contact details given above. 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.

Visitors to my website 

 When someone visits my website, I use a third party service, Google Analytics to collect standard internet log information and details of visitor 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 Google Analytics 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 Google Analytics so that I can continually improve my service to you, You can read Google Analytics Privacy Notice here.  

I use WordPress as the content management system for our website – find out about WordPress and data protection. Like most websites we use cookies to help the site work more efficiently – find out about the use of cookies here. 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.