Clients accessing The Green Rooms Counselling/Psychotherapy/Coaching services enter into the following contract.

Service

The Green Rooms employs many sessional practitioners, all of whom are educated to a minimum of post-graduate level in the discipline of Counselling, Psychotherapy, Counselling Psychology, Art Psychotherapy or Coaching. All our practitioners will strive to support your growth and give you the best service they can. There are never any guarantees with Counselling/Psychotherapy/Coaching, and so (like every reputable company) we are not able to guarantee a specific outcome.

Appointments

Standard appointments are 50-60 minutes long. 1.5-hour appointments may be available on request.

Frequency of appointments can be weekly, twice weekly, fortnightly, or whatever frequency suits you and your practitioner. Frequency is flexible and can be changed over time.

Appointments will take place at a pre-agreed date and time, and via an agreed method. At the time of writing, methods which are covered by insurance are: In-person, Telephone, Video Call.

Appointments (In-person)

Practitioners will always endeavour to be on time.

Please arrive as close to your appointment time as possible. This protects your confidentiality and the confidentiality of the client before you. When you book your first appointment, you will be advised whether or not there is a waiting room available. If there is no waiting room, please do not arrive early. Thank you.

Please note that if you arrive late, your appointment will still end at the scheduled time and the fee will be unchanged. If you are more than 20 minutes late, it may or may not be appropriate to proceed with the appointment; you and your practitioner would discuss this at the time.

Appointments (Telephone or Video Call)

For telephone appointments, the Client calls their Practitioner, as this is considered equivalent to the client knocking on the physical door. For Video Calls, the Practitioner will email the Client a meeting link.

In the event of technical difficulties that disrupt a Video Call, the appointment will be conducted via telephone, with you phoning your practitioner in the first instance, unless agreed otherwise.

If you do not ‘turn up’ at the arranged date and time, the practitioner will attempt to contact you. If you are unreachable, the practitioner will text and/or email you. The practitioner will be available for the remainder of the appointment, and you are welcome to begin the appointment late – the appointment will end at the original agreed time. The appointment will be charged as normal.

Practitioners will always endeavour to be on time. If they are not available at the correct time, they will telephone or Video Call you as soon as they are available. You will receive the full time you have paid for, or a partial refund.

Practitioners will:

• Understand the importance of confidentiality and ensure they have a private, confidential room where they cannot be overheard, and would only be interrupted in an emergency.
• Understand the importance of data protection:
  • Use technology that has been approved by our insurance providers.
  • Never record the appointments.
  • Use devices which are password-protected.
  • Maintain up-to-date virus protection and spyware.
• Request your: name, location (address) during appointment, phone number and GP details. This is to ensure they are able to provide support needed in an emergency.

We request that as a Client, you:

• Ensure you have a private, confidential room where you cannot be overheard, and would only be interrupted in an emergency. This includes answering the doorbell and phone calls.

• Use technology you trust to be secure. 
• Phone or Video Call your Practitioner at the agreed date and time. 
• Consider what you will do for the few minutes after the appointment has ended. It can be helpful to set aside some time to reflect and relax before going about ‘normal business’. Clients who are used to meeting their Practitioner in-person may experience the ending as feeling abrupt. 

Contact between Sessions

If you need to contact your practitioner, please e-mail them. This contact is limited to practical arrangements. Please note that The Green Rooms is not a crisis service and does not have the capacity to offer emergency support. If you feel that you are at risk of harming yourself, we hope that the following organisations will be able to help you immediately.

• 999
• Breathing Space – 0800 83 85 87
• The Samaritans – 116 123
• NHS 24 – 111
• Your GP

If you ‘bump into’ your practitioner outwith your appointments, you have a choice of what to do. You can choose to acknowledge or ignore them, and they will follow your lead. If you choose to acknowledge them, you can smile, wave or say hello, and they will return the gesture as long as they feel it is appropriate. It is not appropriate to get into conversation, and your practitioner will not instigate this or ask you how you are.

Ending

Normally, the ending of the therapeutic relationship is a mutual agreement between you and your practitioner, however you are free to end your relationship at any time.

On rare occasions, your practitioner may end the relationship if they believe that you are not benefiting from the service, they believe that they do not possess the skill-set to work with you, or they leave the company. We strive to allocate you to a practitioner who does have the skill-set to work with you; however, if new issues are disclosed during appointments, this can on occasion result in this particular challenge. Where possible, clients will be offered the option of an alternative practitioner if their existing practitioner leaves the company.

On occasion, the availability of your practitioner may change, and this may affect your regular session day/time. We will do our absolute best to find an alternate day/time with the same practitioner to suit you. If this is not possible, we will discuss the options with you. 

If at any time a client were to be abusive or violate the terms of the client contract (also called ‘client agreement’), their practitioner has the right to immediately end the session and cancel all future arranged sessions.

COUPLES THERAPY AND DOMESTIC ABUSE

The safety of the people involved is our priority. In accordance with professional ethical frameworks:

• If domestic abuse is disclosed or identified with both people present: Couples Therapy sessions will cease immediately and without exception, as it is no longer a safe or appropriate clinical intervention. We will provide signposting to individual support if applicable and safe to do so.
• If domestic abuse is disclosed or identified during an individual session with one partner: The information will be kept confidential to protect the partner at risk. In such an event, Couples Therapy sessions will cease immediately and without exception. We will provide signposting to individual support if applicable and safe to do so.

Payments and Cancellations (Regular Services)

Working days are Monday-Friday, 9am-5pm, not including National Scottish and local East Renfrewshire Bank Holidays. Appointments cancelled less than one working day before the start time will be charged at 100%. Appointments cancelled one to two working days before the start time will be charged at 50%. In exceptional circumstances, this policy may be adjusted.

Your practitioner will endeavour to give you as much notice as possible when they need to cancel your planned appointment. If they need to cancel due to illness, another trusted professional may contact you in their place.

Non-Payment

When payment is owed, no further appointments can be booked until the debt is cleared (unless agreed by The Green Rooms).

Ethical framework

All Coaches, Counsellors and Psychotherapists adhere to the ethical guidelines of the British Association for Behavioural and Cognitive Psychotherapies (BABCP), the British Association for Counselling and Psychotherapy (BACP), Counselling & Psychotherapy in Scotland (COSCA), or, The British Association of Art Therapists (BAAT).

Insurance

All Coaches, Counsellors and Psychotherapists hold indemnity insurance and public liability insurance.

PVG

All Coaches, Counsellors and Psychotherapists hold clean PVG certificates.

Changing Practitioner

It is sometimes possible to change to work with a different Counsellor, Psychotherapist or Coach. If you would like to discuss this, or have any other questions please contact the director, Alison Barr, on: alison.barr@thegreenrooms

Social Networking

The Green Rooms practitioners are not permitted to communicate with clients via social networking. This is to protect the therapeutic nature of the relationship.

Privacy Policy & Terms and Conditions

You can view our Privacy Policy & Terms and Conditions here or click the link in the footer.

Confidentiality

Client confidentiality will be explained to you at your first session, or at your free consultation if you would prefer to understand it more thoroughly before making an appointment.

Safeguarding

Client safeguarding is taken very seriously. Confidentiality will be broken if The Green Rooms practitioner believes that you or another person / other people are in danger of serious harm. Where possible, this will be discussed with you beforehand.

Professional Supervision

Your practitioner undergoes regular ‘professional supervision’ where they discuss their client work in order to be able to offer their clients the best possible service. You will not be personally identified during this process.

Court Subpoena

Your confidentiality legally has to be broken if this is required by a court of law.

Public Health

Public interest is the general welfare and rights of the public that should be recognised, protected and advanced. Disclosures in the public interest, based on the common law, are made where this is essential to prevent a serious and imminent threat to public health, national security, the life of the individual or a third party, or to prevent or detect serious crime.

This clause may become relevant if there is a pandemic and your practitioner is obliged to inform the NHS of people they have been in contact with. They would share your name and contact details, but not the context in which they know you. Your confidentiality as a client would be protected. You may be contacted by the NHS. Your practitioner would do their best to inform you if they disclosed your details to the NHS, but they may be prevented of doing so by their own health or other unavoidable reasons.

Clinical Will

Practitioners will endeavour to let you know as soon as possible if they are not able to attend your arranged appointment. All practitioners have a Clinical Will. This is an arrangement with another professional (‘executor’), which permits the other person to contact you when your practitioner is unable. 

Therapeutic information is not given to the executor, only the client’s name, phone number and/or email address, and any other appropriate information which is deemed to be supportive of the client. This ‘breach of confidentiality’ is covered by the client agreement:
“Your confidentiality is taken very seriously and will only be broken if your Counsellor/Psychotherapist/Coach believes that you …… are in danger of serious harm ….”
If a client’s practitioner disappeared without contact, many clients would experience this as serious psychological harm. Previous to the COVID pandemic, in the rare event of a Clinical Will being used, it was highly unlikely that the executor would also have been unavailable. At a time of unprecedented medical risk, there is an increased chance that Clinical Wills will fail to operate as intended. However, please be assured that our practitioners will regularly stay in touch with the executor of their Clinical Will regarding their health. We understand that a practitioner not turning up for your arranged appointment would be very worrying and unsettling for you, and we offer unreserved apologies if this should happen. The fee you paid will be returned to you in full.