I am committed to protecting your privacy. This notice sets out what I will do with your personal information from the time of your first use of my website (www.awillettcounselling.com) or any initial contact with me, until after our work together has ended.
I, Alison Willett, am registered with the Information Commissioner’s Office as the data controller for A Willett Counselling and Psychotherapy.
Why I collect your information
The UK GDPR states that I must have a lawful basis for processing your personal information. There are different lawful bases depending on the stage at which I am processing your data, as follows:
UK data protection regulation and the GDPR also makes sure that I look after any sensitive personal information that you may disclose to me appropriately as part of our work together. This type of information is called ‘special category data’:
How I use your information when you visit my website
No user-specific data is collected by me when you visit my website and information is processed in a way that does not identify anyone. I do not make any attempt to find out the identities of anyone visiting my website.
If you fill in a form on my website, that information will be sent to me by email.
How I use your information when you contact me
When you contact me by email, telephone, text message, or via my website with an enquiry about my services I will collect information to help me satisfy your enquiry. This will include your name, email address, telephone number any other information you choose to give me.
Any information I collect is stored electronically on a passcode protected smartphone, on a password protected laptop, and on password protected third-party exchange servers, including Gmail and iCloud in accordance with UK data protection regulation, the UK GDPR and ICO requirements.
Whether we agree to work together or not, everything we discuss is strictly confidential. I will never disclose any information about you or what we discuss to any third party unless I am required to do so in line with ethical, contractual or legal obligations, or where I feel there is a risk to your safety or to the safety of others. If I do need to disclose information for these purposes I will always try to do this in discussion with you and with your consent.
If you decide not to proceed I will ensure all your personal information is deleted as soon as reasonably possible and no later than within 30 days.
If we agree to work together, in compliance with professional ethical requirements, I will keep anonymised therapy session notes. Personal information and therapy session notes will be kept for a period of 5 years, in case we work together again in the future and to meet insurance purposes, at which time they will then be destroyed.
The information I collect may be used to enhance the quality of the therapeutic experience through regular clinical supervision, which is also a professional requirement.
On the lawful basis of legitimate interest, information is processed to: provide a counselling and psychotherapy service; meet my professional and ethical responsibilities as a therapist, operate a business to generate a livelihood, including promoting and marketing this business.
How I store your information
I will protect your information in any or all of the following ways:
Your rights
You have a right to ask me to correct or delete your personal information, to limit how I use your personal information, to stop processing your personal information or to transfer your personal information to another person. 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 https://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 awillettcounselling@gmail.com. If you make a request, I will try to respond within 30 days.
If you have a complaint about how I handle your personal data please do not hesitate to get in touch with me by emailing me at the address above. I always 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 https://ico.org.uk/make-a-complaint/.
Consent
By accessing and using my website, by contacting me by email, telephone, text message or via my website and by agreeing to work with me, you consent to the collection and use of data about you as set out in this notice.
Contact Information
If you have any questions about this Privacy Policy please contact me by email using:
awillettcounselling@gmail.com
This notice was last updated January 2025.
We need your consent to load the translations
We use a third-party service to translate the website content that may collect data about your activity. Please review the details in the privacy policy and accept the service to view the translations.