Privacy Policy - Clients & Website Visitors

Your privacy is very important to us and we want you to be confident that your personal information will be kept safe and secure and will only be used for the purpose it was given to us. We 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 we will do with your personal information from the initial point of contact through to after your therapy has ended, including:

• Why we can process your information and what purpose we are processing it for
• Whether you have to provide it to us
• How long do we store it for
• Whether there are other recipients of your personal information
• Whether we intend to transfer it to another country,
• Whether we 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, Stacie Clifford, via email: info@daisychaincounselling.co.uk

‘Data controller’ is the term used to describe the person/organisation that collects and stores and has responsibility for people’s personal data. For the purpose of this website and my work as a counsellor, the data controller is Stacie Clifford. For CPD workshops and all other training, the data controller is the host organisation.

I am registered with the Information Commissioner’s Office Registration Reference: Stacie Clifford ZB551603

Info@daisychaincounselling.co.uk

GDPR states that we must have a lawful basis for processing your personal data. Different lawful bases depend on the stage at which I am processing your data.

If you have had therapy, we will use legitimate interest as my lawful basis for holding and using your personal information.

If you are currently having therapy with us, or if you are in contact with us to consider these services, we will process your personal data where it is necessary for the performance of our contract.

The GDPR also ensures that we appropriately look after any sensitive personal information you may disclose to us. This type of information is called ‘special category personal information’. The lawful basis for us processing any special categories of personal information is that it is for the provision of health treatment (in this case therapy) and necessary for a contract with a health professional (in this case, a contract between us).

Initial Contact

When you contact us with an enquiry about our services, I will collect information to help me respond to your enquiry. This will include your name, email address, and phone number (optional).

If you decide not to proceed, I will ensure all your personal data is deleted within one year. If you would like me to delete this information sooner, please get in touch.

While you are accessing our services, rest assured that everything you discuss with us is confidential. Confidentiality will only be broken in the following instances:

• Where you give consent for the confidence to be broken.
• Where we are compelled by a court of law.
• Where the information is of such gravity that confidentiality cannot be maintained e.g., where there is risk of serious harm to self or others, or in cases of fraud and crime.

We will always try to speak to you about this first, unless safeguarding issues prevent us from doing so.

If we proceed with therapy, we will keep a record of your personal details. This includes your name, date of birth, email address, phone number, home address, and details of your GP practice This is to help services run smoothly, and in cases where there is a risk of serious harm we may contact your GP. Please be aware that we will not routinely contact your GP to inform them of your attendance because this information is confidential. To fulfil my duty of care towards you while also maintaining your confidentiality, I will only contact your GP if it is necessary and should these circumstances arise, I would discuss this with you wherever possible. These details are kept securely and will not be shared with any third party (excepting the conditions above).

Note Taking

Notes taken during a session will be kept to a minimum and kept securely on digital on a cloud system, which is GDPR compliant and ISO27001 certified. Information is encrypted and stored securely. I use two-factor authentication to add another layer of security. For more information: https://www.writeupp.com/security

Session notes are stored separately from your personal details and will not have any identifying details; however, they will be linked to your personal information by a client code (e.g., DE123). In this way, the data will be ‘pseudonymised’. In addition, we may agree that you will fill out some therapy-related measures, and we will store these with the notes above—again, pseudonymising the data with a code.

We are required to be under regular supervision and will discuss client work with a qualified supervisor. At such times, I will take all possible measures to preserve your anonymity.

For security purposes, I do not retain text or WhatsApp or text messages for more than one year. If there is relevant information contained in a message, I will insert it into my notes. Likewise, any email correspondence will be deleted after one year if it is not important. If necessary I will insert it into my notes.

After Services Have Ended

Once our therapy has ended, your personal details will be kept for seven years in accordance with our insurance policy, which begins from the end of our contact. For any persons under the age of 18, your data will be stored for 7 years at the point at which you turn 18.

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 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 Stacie Clifford, info@daisychaincounselling.co.uk. It may take up to 28 days to process this request.

If you have any complaints about how I handle your personal data, please do not hesitate to get in touch with me by emailing on 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.

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 on the WriteUpp cloud-based application.

When someone visits my website, I use a third-party service, Webhealer, 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 Webhealer 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 Webhealer Analytics so that I can continually improve my service to you. You can read Webhealers privacy policy here.

Like most websites, we use cookies to help the site work more efficiently—find out about our 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.