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 statement 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.
‘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 and my registration number is ZC083784
If you wish to make a complaint about how your data has been handled then please contact:
info@philippalyonstherapy.com
In accordance with ICO guidance I will acknowledge complaints within 30 days, take appropriate steps to respond to complaints, including making appropriate enquiries, keeping people informed and without undue delay, tell people the outcome of their complaints.
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 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).
Initial contact:
When you contact me with an enquiry about my therapy services I will collect information to help me satisfy your enquiry. This will include your name and contact details. Alternatively, another health professional may send me your details when making a referral or a parent or 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 1 month. Should you wish your details to be deleted sooner - you can do this by requesting it via email.
While you are accessing counselling:
What you share with me is confidential. There are, however, some specific circumstances where confidentiality may need to be broken:
1. Case discussion with my clinical supervisor – this is standard ethical practice, and no client names are used and identifiable details removed. Clinical supervisors are bound by the same code of ethics and confidentiality.
2. For legal and ethical reasons – I am not bound by confidentiality if in good faith I feel that I can assist in the prevention or detection of a serious crime, which includes (but is not limited to) safeguarding issues regarding children or vulnerable adults, crimes regarding substantial financial gains and losses, and acts of terrorism.
3. If I believe there is a risk of harm to yourself or others.
4. If subpoenaed by a court of law.
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 service run smoothly. These details are stored securely in password-protected files and are not shared with any third party.
I will keep written notes of each session which are also kept in password-protected files. Email correspondence will be deleted after 1 month if it is not required. If necessary, I will store any relevant information securely in a password-protected file.
After our work ends:
Once counselling has ended, your records will be kept for 5 years from the end of our contact and will then be securely destroyed.
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 (i.e. my email provider or whatsapp). 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.
Outside of email, whataspp and my website, I use Microsoft Office for secure storage of notes, files are password protected. I use Zoom for video call software but not share any personal or contact details in this platform.
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 you 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 its, 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 to info@philippalyonstherapy.com
If you have any complaint about how I handle your personal data please do not hesitate to get in touch with me by emailing the contact email 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
I take the security of the data I hold about you seriously and as such I take every effort to make sure it is kept secure. All notes and information are stored securely and password protected at the document level, accessed from devices that are password protected and used only by myself.
When someone visits my website, some basic technical information may be collected automatically, such as standard internet log data. This helps ensure the website runs securely and functions as expected.
This information does not identify you personally, and I have no interest in identifying individual visitors.
I use legitimate interests as my lawful basis for processing this information, as it is necessary for maintaining the security and performance of the website.
My website is built using Google Sites.
Like most websites, this site may use essential cookies to support basic functionality. These cookies do not collect personally identifiable information.
If you choose to contact me by email, the information you provide will be processed in line with the rest of this privacy policy. 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.
Thank you for taking the time to read this Privacy Statement.
You are welcome to contact me directly with any questions you have about my data protection policy at info@philippalyonstherapy.com