1. Sessions are usually on a weekly basis and last for 60 minutes. Initial contracts are for 6 sessions, at which point we will have a review and negotiate a further contract for working together if necessary.
2. I charge for all sessions we have booked, whether or not you attend.
3. I will review my fees annually and if I decide to increase them, I will discuss this with you and give you 3 months notice of any increase.
4. Gestalt and Integrative Psychotherapy are holistic approaches and sickness may be an important part of the therapy process, so please try to attend your session even if you are feeling unwell. If your illness is infectious please telephone me first.
5. Please give me at least 3 days (72 hours) notice if you need to change or cancel a pre-booked session. If you give me less than 3 days notice and we are able to re-arrange your session in the same week then I will not charge for the cancellation; otherwise the full fee is payable.
6. Our work is confidential. The only place I discuss it is in professional supervision. I will deal sensitively with any of the details of your therapy that I share, including tape-recorded material from our sessions. I may break confidentiality if I consider that you or others may be at risk of harm, or matters relating to child protection and serious crime. I would hope to discuss this with you first if possible.
7. I work according to the code of ethics of the The UK Council for Psychotherapy and the Sherwood Psychotherapy Training Institute, a copy of which are available from me on request.
8. When you decide to leave therapy, I would like to discuss this with you and generally if we have been working together for a significant period of time we would have a minimum of 4 sessions to finish therapy.
9. If you intend to be, or are engaged in any form of alternative therapy with others whilst I am working with you, then please let me know and we will discuss the appropriateness of this. It is not ethical practice for two individual therapists to work continuously with the same client.
Life & Relationship Therapy
