Internet and Telephone Counselling Service Agreement

This document serves as the basis of the agreement for accessing my online and telephone counselling services. You are requested to read this service agreement before beginning counselling. If you have any questions or concerns regarding the agreement, please bring these up with your counsellor in the first session.

1. Balancing privacy and safety

While Patricia Ann Hornsbury – Thrive Counselling & Coaching - endeavours to respect your privacy at all times, as discussed in our Privacy Statement there are some things that are important for you to know in engaging with any of our online or telephone services.

In providing counselling services we are dedicated to supporting your ongoing wellbeing and the wellbeing of those around you. If we identify concerns that you are at immediate risk of harm by yourself or from others, or that someone else is at immediate risk of harm, we will speak with you about this. We will typically follow the below process:

Your counsellor will attempt to obtain as much relevant information as necessary.
Your counsellor will attempt to refer you to appropriate face-to-face services.
Your counsellor may use the information that you provide to us to contact you directly in order to provide support and/or practical assistance.
We will, as required by law, send the information we have available to us to the relevant authorities in order to protect all parties involved (we will discuss this with you first).
- This information will include the personal and contact information you give us when you register. It will also include information that is available to us as a result of contact, such as your telephone number or IP address.
If you have chosen to remain anonymous or do not respond, your counsellor may seek to establish your identity and notify appropriate emergency services in order to avert risk.
In the event that you choose not to provide us with this information, we may be unable to provide follow up in the event of an emergency. We are limited in the amount of practical help that we can offer by the information that you provide.

You may of course choose to remain anonymous, but by doing so you acknowledge that we will not be able to assist you in any way. In this case we will not be held responsible for outcomes outside of our control.

2. Data security

Patricia Ann Hornsbury – Thrive Counselling & Coaching - is committed to keeping data secure. We use Zoom, an encrypted video service. However, we do not believe any internet service is completely 100% secure and you need to be aware of this. It is equally as important that you take whatever measures that you are able to ensure that your information is safe, especially if you share a computer with others.

Some steps that we recommend you take include:

Ensure security of your account passwords (e.g. for your email account, your Windows account, etc).
If you use a local email program for your counselling emails (e.g. Microsoft Outlook or Windows Mail), ensure it cannot be opened by other members of the household. Use a separate Windows account.
It is advised that you do not send any therapeutic or private content in an open email, but attach these responses to your emails as a password protected Word document.
If engaging in live chat counselling, you may want to clear your browser history, cache or temporary internet files, and cookies after each session. This will ensure no one knows you are engaging in our services.
If you choose to keep your chat session transcripts, store them securely (e.g. in a password protected Word document or Zip file).
Always keep your virus definitions up to date.
Do not engage in online counselling using a public computer, or where the content of exchanges could be viewed by others in close proximity.

3. Ways of working together

Patricia Ann Hornsbury – Thrive Counselling & Coaching - offers a variety of methods of accessing our services, each with their own benefits and limitations – face to face/video conferencing and telephone counselling. Please read the relevant information for each service type and choose the one you think will work best for you.

It is also important that you prepare for the sessions by ensuring that your equipment is working and that you have a quiet and safe space to engage in counselling. Please, arrange your time and space so that you are able to engage without interruptions.

4. Counsellors

Patricia Ann Hornsbury – Thrive Counselling & Coaching – is registered with PACFA and adheres to all the PACFA guidelines.

If at any point within your counselling you feel that your counsellor is acting unethically, it is suggested that you discuss this with your counsellor in the hopes that a resolution can be found. If you are unable to do so, please contact PACFA.

If, after engaging with your counsellor online, you decide you would like to move to either telephone or face-to-face counselling, please raise this with your counsellor.

5. Sessions

Counselling sessions last for 50 minutes. Live sessions will take place at the time you arrange to meet with your counsellor. The frequency of counselling sessions is something you can negotiate with your counsellor, however weekly sessions are generally recommended at the outset.

If you are late for a live session, the counsellor will wait for you there for up to 15 minutes, and can begin when you arrive. The session will still end at the scheduled time, as the counsellor will have other appointments afterwards. If you do not show up for your session, or show up over 15 minutes late, you will need to book another one. Your counsellor will contact you to arrange this, if not, please get in touch with your counsellor directly.

5.a Cancellations

If for some reason you will be unable to attend your session, we kindly request that you email your counsellor to arrange to reschedule at least 24 hours in advance. This gives other clients the opportunity to make use of that vacant spot.

If you do not show for your scheduled session, your counsellor will send you an email to check in and see if you would like to schedule another one. If sessions are missed on a consistent basis your counsellor may open a discussion with you as to the reasons for this. This will be to brainstorm solutions; for example we may suggest postponing counselling until you feel ready or are more able to attend.

5.b Technical difficulties

When a session ends prematurely due to technical difficulty, or you are unable to connect to a session due to technical difficulty, please email or call your counsellor to let them know.

If the difficulty is unable to be resolved at the scheduled time, your counsellor will reschedule your session with you. If you are unable to connect at all, then email, telephone or face-to-face counselling are other options.

The number of email sessions you are entitled to is difficult to quantify. We will aim to give you ten hours of counsellor time, or the equivalent of ten live chat counselling sessions. There is opportunity to extend this on a case-by-case basis.

6. Limits of counsellor responses

Any emailed messages you receive from your counsellor are protected by copyright. Further, messages from your counsellor have been tailored to your own particular situation, thus cannot be generalised to other individuals. Therefore as a part of your service agreement it is asked that you do not forward, post or otherwise copy the content of your messages unless you receive the prior consent of Patricia Ann Hornsbury – Thrive Counselling & Coaching.