1. About this Privacy Statement
I am Nikki Bellerby, practitioner at Lotus Wave Hypnotherapy.
I take your privacy and confidentiality seriously and am committed to protecting your personal information. This Privacy Statement explains what information I collect, why I collect it, how it is used and stored, when it may be shared, how long it is retained, and your rights regarding your personal information.
Contact details
Email: nicola@lotuswavehypnotherapy.co.uk
Telephone: 07474 873007
If you have any questions about this Privacy Statement or how your personal information is handled, please contact me using the details above.
2. Information I may collect
To provide you with an appropriate and safe service, I may collect information including:
- your name, date of birth and contact details;
- emergency contact details, where appropriate;
- information you provide when making an enquiry;
- information about your reasons for seeking hypnotherapy and your goals for therapy;
- relevant physical or mental health information, medical history and medication information;
- information you choose to share during consultations and hypnotherapy sessions;
- notes made during or following consultations and sessions;
- appointment and attendance information;
- correspondence and communications between us;
- information relating to payments and transactions where relevant; and
- other information that is reasonably necessary to provide my services safely and appropriately.
Some of the information you provide may be considered special category personal data under UK data protection law. This includes information concerning your physical or mental health.
I will only collect information that is relevant to providing my services, maintaining appropriate professional records and managing my professional relationship with you.
3. How I collect your information
I may collect personal information directly from you when you contact Lotus Wave Hypnotherapy, complete client documentation, communicate with me or participate in hypnotherapy sessions.
Initial contact may be made through the Lotus Wave Hypnotherapy website, email, telephone, WhatsApp or following a referral from another person or professional.
Where you have been referred by someone else, I may receive limited information about you from the person or organisation making the referral. Further information will normally be obtained directly from you.
4. Why I use your information
I may use your personal information to:
- respond to enquiries;
- assess whether hypnotherapy and my services are appropriate for you;
- arrange and manage sessions;
- provide hypnotherapy and related therapeutic services;
- communicate with you regarding your sessions;
- maintain appropriate client and session records;
- manage the professional relationship between us;
- maintain appropriate financial and administrative records;
- meet professional, insurance, legal or regulatory requirements;
- protect your or another person's vital interests where necessary;
- understand how this website is used and improve its content and performance; and
- send marketing communications where permitted and where you have chosen to receive them.
5. Lawful basis for processing your information
Under UK data protection law, Lotus Wave Hypnotherapy must have a lawful basis for collecting and using your personal information.
For personal information that is necessary to respond to your enquiry, arrange sessions and provide the hypnotherapy services you have requested, I will normally rely on Article 6(1)(b) of the UK GDPR - contract, including taking steps at your request before entering into a therapeutic agreement with you.
During the course of hypnotherapy, you may provide information concerning your physical or mental health and wellbeing. This is considered special category personal data and receives additional protection under data protection law.
For processing relevant health and wellbeing information for the purpose of providing hypnotherapy services, Lotus Wave Hypnotherapy will normally rely on Article 9(2)(a) of the UK GDPR - your explicit consent.
Your explicit consent will be requested separately as part of the client intake and consent process.
You have the right to withdraw your consent to the processing of special category information at any time. Withdrawal of consent does not affect the lawfulness of processing that took place before consent was withdrawn. However, withdrawing consent may mean that I am unable to continue providing hypnotherapy services where processing that information is necessary to provide the service safely and appropriately.
In certain limited circumstances, I may be required or permitted to process or disclose information without your consent, for example where required by law, in connection with legal proceedings, or where there is a serious safeguarding or safety concern. Where this occurs, I will only use or disclose information where there is an appropriate lawful basis for doing so.
For privacy-focused website analytics, where the processing involves personal information, I rely on Article 6(1)(f) of the UK GDPR - legitimate interests. My legitimate interest is understanding how the Lotus Wave Hypnotherapy website is used so that I can maintain and improve it. I seek to minimise the information collected and provide visitors with a simple way to object to analytics.
6. Confidentiality and sharing your information
Your privacy and confidentiality are an important part of the therapeutic relationship.
Information you share with Lotus Wave Hypnotherapy will be treated as confidential and will not normally be shared with another person or organisation without your consent.
There are, however, limited circumstances where confidentiality may need to be broken. Information may be disclosed where:
- you have given your consent for information to be shared;
- disclosure is required by law or legal process;
- there is a safeguarding concern involving a child or vulnerable person; or
- there is good reason to believe that you, another person or the public may be at serious risk of harm if relevant information is not disclosed.
Where it is necessary to disclose information, I will aim to share only information that is relevant and necessary to the situation.
Professional supervision
As part of maintaining safe and professional practice, I may discuss aspects of client work with an appropriately qualified professional supervisor.
Supervision is conducted confidentially and is intended to support safe, ethical and effective therapeutic practice. Wherever reasonably possible, information will be discussed without identifying the client.
Other professionals
There may be occasions where it would be appropriate to communicate with another professional involved in your care, such as your GP or another healthcare professional.
Where appropriate, this would normally be discussed with you first and your consent obtained before information is shared, unless there is a legal requirement or a significant safeguarding or safety concern that means information needs to be disclosed without your consent.
7. Online sessions and communications
Hypnotherapy sessions are provided remotely using online video communication services such as Zoom.
I may also communicate with you by email, telephone or WhatsApp, depending on the contact details you provide and the method of communication being used.
These services are provided by third-party technology providers and some personal information may therefore be processed by those providers when you use their services.
I take reasonable steps to use appropriate services and protect the confidentiality of communications. Information transmitted electronically is also subject to the privacy and security arrangements of the relevant service provider.
8. How your information is stored
Client records are primarily stored digitally using a secure cloud-based storage provider.
Some records may also be retained in paper form. Paper records will be stored securely.
Access to client records is restricted to Nikki Bellerby except where disclosure is required or permitted by law or as otherwise explained in this Privacy Statement.
Reasonable and appropriate measures are taken to protect your personal information against unauthorised access, loss, disclosure or misuse.
9. How long your information is kept
Lotus Wave Hypnotherapy follows professional record-keeping standards when determining how long client records are retained.
For adult clients, records will normally be retained for 8 years following the last interaction with Lotus Wave Hypnotherapy.
For clients who are under 18 at the time of their last interaction, records will normally be retained until their 26th birthday.
Records may need to be retained for a different period where there is a legal, professional or insurance requirement to do so.
At the end of the applicable retention period, records will be securely deleted or destroyed unless there is a lawful reason for retaining them for longer.
10. Website analytics
This website uses Umami Cloud, a privacy-focused analytics service, to help me understand how the website is used and to improve its content and performance.
Umami does not use cookies in its website tracking code. The analytics information collected may include page views, the referring website, browser, operating system, device type, screen size, browser language and approximate location. An IP address may be used by Umami to create an anonymous session identifier and determine approximate location, but Umami states that IP addresses are not stored.
Anonymous session information may show the pages viewed during a visit. Lotus Wave Hypnotherapy does not provide Umami with names, email addresses, client information or health information for analytics purposes, and does not use a Distinct ID to identify website visitors. Session replay and heatmap recording are not used on this website.
The Umami Cloud account used for this website is configured so that its analytics data is stored in the UK. Analytics data is retained in accordance with the Umami Cloud account settings and applicable plan.
The tracker is configured to respect a visitor's browser Do Not Track setting and not to collect URL query parameters. Analytics are used to understand website usage and improve the website, not for advertising or cross-site tracking.
Your analytics choice
You can object to website analytics at any time on this browser using the button below. If you disable analytics, a preference will be stored in your browser so that Umami does not record future visits from that browser. You can change your choice at any time.
11. Marketing communications
From time to time, Lotus Wave Hypnotherapy may offer newsletters, information about services, events or other promotional communications.
Where consent is required, marketing communications will only be sent if you have chosen to receive them.
You can change your mind and stop receiving marketing communications at any time by contacting Lotus Wave Hypnotherapy or by using any unsubscribe option provided with the communication.
Choosing not to receive marketing communications will not affect the hypnotherapy services you receive.
12. Your data protection rights
Depending on the circumstances, UK data protection law gives you a number of rights concerning your personal information. These may include the right to:
- request access to the personal information I hold about you;
- ask for inaccurate or incomplete information to be corrected;
- ask for your personal information to be erased in certain circumstances;
- ask me to restrict the processing of your information in certain circumstances;
- object to certain uses of your personal information;
- request the transfer of your information in certain circumstances; and
- withdraw consent where consent is being relied upon.
Not all rights apply in every situation, and there may be circumstances where information needs to be retained despite a request for deletion.
If you would like to exercise any of your data protection rights, please contact me using the details at the beginning of this Privacy Statement.
13. Concerns and complaints
If you have any concerns about how your personal information has been collected, used or stored, please contact me so that I have an opportunity to address your concerns.
You also have the right to raise a concern with the Information Commissioner's Office (ICO), the UK's independent data protection regulator.
Further information about your data protection rights and how to make a complaint is available from the Information Commissioner's Office.
14. Changes to this Privacy Statement
I may update this Privacy Statement from time to time to reflect changes in my practice, the services I use, professional guidance or legal requirements.
The latest version will show the date on which it was last updated.