Counseling Contract and Consent – please read carefully

All counsellors have completed or are working towards completion of relevant professional training as well as specialised training in bereavement. They are either registered or working towards registration with a professional body (BACP or UKCP). All counsellors work to the British Association of Counselling and Psychotherapy (BACP) code of ethics, which can be found at www.bacp.co.uk

Respecting your confidentiality is of the utmost importance to us, wherever possible we keep your information confidential within The Laura Centre. All counsellors discuss aspects of their client work with their clinical supervisor; this is a confidential professional relationship. Unless you have given us permission or asked us to share information, we will aim to keep confidentiality (as above). However, if it is assessed that there is a serious risk of harm to yourself or others, it may be necessary to alert other people, such as your GP of our concerns. Careful consideration should be given before disclosing anything of a previously unreported criminal nature because The Laura Centre needs to comply with the law and may find it necessary to notify other agencies, particularly when the protection of children and vulnerable adults is a concern. Depending on the particular circumstances, we would aim to discuss disclosure to others with you beforehand wherever possible.

The Laura Centre meets and upholds the principles of General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR). Standard professional procedure requires that summary notes be made by your counsellor. These notes are usually very brief and are stored on a secure database at The Laura Centre. Your name and address will not appear on the notes. We produce summary statistics of users of the Centre and these are publicly available e.g. according to ethnicity, age, general cause of death. (Please ask if you want full details of our data protection policy).

The service is free at the point of need. However, any donation would be appreciated. You might like to consider making a regular donation when you attend sessions.

If you are unhappy with the support you receive from your counsellor, we encourage you whenever possible, to talk through your concerns with them. If this is not possible or they are unresolved, 2 please raise your concerns with the Director of Therapeutic Services or Chief Executive of The Laura Centre. A copy of our complaint’s procedure is available in the waiting room or from reception.

If you are unable to keep a planned appointment we would appreciate as much notice as possible (preferably more than 2 working days), please telephone 0116 254 4341. If the office is closed you can leave a message on our answer machine. Appointments which are cancelled on the day, will be classed as a ‘did not attend’ appointment. If you do not attend or give us notice about cancelling for two appointments in a row, we will not contact you and your case will be closed. If you have any further appointments booked, these will be cancelled. If you contact us later you may need to wait before being offered an appointment.

This is a working agreement aimed at providing you and your counsellor with boundaries and a structure within which to work. It is also possible to renegotiate this agreement or add other agreements in the course of the counselling contact. Indeed, during the first session of counselling your counsellor will: • explain more about the process of counselling, including their specific way of working • confirm our agreement about confidentiality and discuss boundaries, for instance agree a response to a chance meeting elsewhere • discuss timings of sessions and the importance of punctuality • come to an initial agreement on the number of sessions and how counselling will be reviewed • highlight the procedure for cancelling an appointment – either by you or the counsellor • agree the procedure for resuming counselling after an unplanned interruption, for example, through illness.