Privacy Policy
Your privacy is very 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
Your data protection rights.
Using this website
Using this website
This website is hosted by Squarespace. Squarespace collects personal information when you visit this website, including:
Information about your browser, network and device
Web pages you visited prior to coming to this website
Web pages you view while on this website
Your IP address
Squarespace needs the data to run this website, and to protect and improve its platform and services. You can read more about how Squarespace uses your data (site usage information of end users) for its own purposes in their Privacy Policy.
Analytics
This website collects personal information to power our site analytics, including:
Information about your browser, network, and device
Web pages you visited prior to coming to this website
Your IP address
This information may also include details about your use of this website, including:
Clicks
Internal links
Pages visited
Scrolling
Searches
Timestamps
This information is provided to Squarespace, my website analytics provider, to learn about site traffic and activity.
Cookies
This website uses cookies and similar technologies, which are small files or pieces of text that download to a device when a visitor accesses a website or app. For information about viewing the cookies dropped on your device, visit The cookies Squarespace uses.
These necessary and required cookies are always used, which allow Squarespace, our hosting platform, to securely serve this website to you.
These analytics and performance cookies are used on this website, as described below, only when you acknowledge our cookie banner. This website uses analytics and performance cookies to view site traffic, activity, and other data.
Starting psychotherapy with me
I am happy to chat through any questions you might have about my data protection policy and you can contact me via email to do so. ‘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 [registration number ZC169142].
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. 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).
How I use your information
Initial contact:
When you contact me with an enquiry about my counselling services I will collect information to help me satisfy your enquiry. This will include your name, address, emergency contact and GP name and address. Alternatively, your GP or other 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 one year. If you would like me to delete this information sooner, just let me know.
While you are accessing psychotherapy:
Rest assured that everything you discuss with me is confidential. As discussed that confidentiality will only be broken as per the terms discussed earlier in the Confidentiality section. 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 counselling services run smoothly. These details are kept securely on a device specifically for the purposes of providing psychotherapy and are not shared with any third party. As mentioned earlier in this document, I will keep written notes of each session. For security reasons I do not retain text messages for more than one year. If there is relevant information contained in a text message I will mention this within our session notes. Likewise, any email correspondence will be deleted after one year for anything that is not incorporated into our session notes.
After our sessions have ended:
Once our sessions have ended your records will be kept for 7 years from the end of our contact with each other and then securely destroyed. If you want me to delete your information sooner than this, please tell me.
Third party recipients of personal data
Your data may be shared with select third parties, for example, where I have contracted with a supplier to carry out specific tasks, such as Sessionly which is a GDPR compliant practice management tool which helps me organise client contracts and documentation. Sessionly will only hold an abbreviated version of your name, any documentation you fill out such as the therapy contract and questionnaires. In all cases I have carefully selected which partners I work with and will always let you know which providers I am working with.
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 addressing it to rehnuma.therapy@gmail.com.
Data security
If you have any complaint about how I handle your personal data please do not hesitate to get in touch with me by writing or emailing to 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.