What happens to your information.

Rosie Darnelle, trading as Lamplight Counselling, [Street address], Edinburgh [postcode]. You can reach me by email or on phone.

At first contact: your name, or what you would like me to call you, and a way to reach you — an email address or a phone number — plus whatever you choose to tell me about what is going on. You do not need to give me anything more than that.

If we go on to work together: brief session notes, held securely and separately from your name.

Enquiries are held with your explicit consent, given when you get in touch. Session notes for people I am seeing are held under the lawful basis that covers health and care provision, which works differently from consent and cannot simply be withdrawn once we are working together — I can explain what that means for you if it is relevant.

Nobody, except: [Microsoft, if you book online], which is a separate service with its own privacy terms; my email provider, [provider name]; and my clinical supervisor, who hears about my work in a way that does not identify you.

[To be confirmed once the booking and video-call platforms are chosen, and stated here before launch.]

Enquiries that do not go on to become appointments: deleted within three months. Session notes: destroyed after [retention period] years. After that, everything is gone.

You can ask to see what I hold about you, ask me to correct it, object to how it is used, or ask for a copy of it. You can withdraw consent for an enquiry that has not gone anywhere. Once you are a client, the right to have session notes deleted on request does not apply in the same way, because they are held under a different lawful basis — I would rather tell you that plainly now than have it come as a surprise later. Where I can meet what you are asking for, I will.

Tell me first if you feel able to — most things are easier to put right that way. You can also complain to the Information Commissioner's Office, which regulates how personal information is used in the UK. I am registered with them, registration number [ICO registration number].