Client Contract

Stigma-Free Counselling Client Contract

Aim of Counselling

The aim of counselling is to provide you, the client, with a confidential opportunity to explore personal and relational issues in safety. During counselling, we set goals agreed upon between the client and the therapist. The client agrees to work towards the agreed goals. The role of Stigma-Free Counselling is to help you through this process without judgment or telling you what to do. We may on occasions give information, homework, or offer suggestions. If at any time we feel we can no longer help you, we will offer to refer you to someone who can.

A therapist cannot fix your problems for you, and with personal or relationship issues, the work will ultimately have to be done by you. You are paying us for our expertise, and we will be providing you with information and making suggestions. The more you can take what was discussed during your session with us and practice it, apply it, work at it, or think about it in between sessions, the more you will get out of coming to see us.

Frequency of Sessions & Length of Therapy

We find that there are benefits to making sessions weekly. Particularly in the early stages of therapy, many people find it hard to maintain the “momentum” of change outside of sessions, and hence more frequent sessions help keep things on track. However, how often you come is affected by practical matters such as your ability to make time, cost, travel, etc. Sessions run for 50 minutes.

Involvement with Other Therapies

It is important to let us know of any involvement you have with any other health professionals, any other types of therapy, individual or group counselling, or personal growth work. It is especially important to inform us about any forms of medication you are taking. This is to ensure we are not working at cross purposes with any other help you are receiving.

Differences Between Therapist and Client

When a therapist is of a different gender, age, class, religion, sexual orientation, or ethnicity from you, there will probably be aspects of your experience that they will not know about or understand. We may want to talk to you about these differences to ensure understanding.

Payment

Face-to-face and online clients normally pay at the end of each session. You can pay by cash or by internet banking. Online Sessions should be paid in advance via Bank Transfer.

Missed Appointments and Late Cancellations

We try to be flexible with clients changing appointment times to suit. If you get sick or busy and doubt you’ll make the appointment, please contact us the day before (on the Friday if it’s a Monday appointment) and let us know. If you are late, your appointment will still have to finish on time to be fair to the next client. Any cancellations made within 24 hours of the session will incur a fee equivalent to the full session amount.

Confidentiality & Limits to Confidentiality

In most cases, the fact that you are seeing us and anything you might say to us is private, and we will not disclose without your permission. There are exceptions to this privacy:

With your permission, we will liaise with other health professionals involved in your care to assist you in receiving the best possible care. If you have been referred to us, we will normally ask your permission to liaise with the referrer, usually just to acknowledge the referral. If you have other professionals involved in your ongoing care, it is in your interests that we liaise with them in order to coordinate the help you are receiving. This still requires your permission.

If there is a situation where you or someone else are at risk of serious harm, which we could prevent by breaking confidentiality, then we will act to prevent that harm. Unless there is an emergency or it would increase the risk of harm, we would still try to discuss this with you first.

If your therapy is being paid for by someone else, they will need to know whether or not you are attending. Where it is being paid for by an agency such as ACC, an insurance company, your employer, CYFS, etc., there is likely to be an obligation to report to them about the therapy. Your therapist will normally consult you about what is going to be reported.

We do not release therapy files to clients for use in court proceedings unless ordered. This is not their intended use, and they are too open to misinterpretation.

All counsellors receive professional supervision from senior colleagues and peers on a regular basis. This is where we discuss aspects of our work that are challenging, successful, or just seem to need reflecting on. Regular supervision provides a check on the quality and safety of our work, a means to develop our knowledge and skills, and a place where we can talk about ways that our work is affecting us personally. Though the focus is primarily on us and our work, we, of course, have to talk about our clients during supervision. We do our best to avoid saying anything that might identify a client.

Notes & Files

We keep a record of each session on file while we are working with you. We do keep notes securely after therapy in case you choose to return at any stage.

Contact Outside of Therapy

Normally, if we meet you accidentally in public, we will wait for you to make the first approach. It is OK to ignore us if you want. Stigma-Free Counselling has a public Facebook and Instagram account.

Extra Support and Crisis Situations

We are only able to offer limited support outside of session times. We are willing to make extra appointments as our schedules permit. It is OK for you to phone, text, and email us if you need to, but remember that we may not be able to talk for long, you might get our voicemail, and it may take us a while to get back to you. In a crisis situation, you will need to rely on public crisis services such as Lifeline (13 11 14) or your local Community Mental Health team in Australia.