Your privacy.

1. Who is responsible

Gillian Misplon of Gillian Misplon Counselling, 214 Carpe Diem, Melkbosstrand, 7441, is the responsible party for your personal information and acts as the practice’s Information Officer. You can reach her on WhatsApp at 069 720 0442.

2. What is collected

• Account and contact details: your name, email address and WhatsApp number when you create a booking account, or your name and number when you message on WhatsApp.
• Booking details: the sessions you book, move or cancel, change requests, and any note you add to a booking.
• Counselling records: information you share in sessions and notes Gillian keeps as part of your confidential counselling record. Some of this may be special personal information, such as information about your health.
• Messages: WhatsApp messages you send, including anything you write in the contact form on this website, which opens WhatsApp with your message for you to send.
• Technical information: the minimum needed to run the website and keep you signed in, such as a secure session cookie and standard server logs. There are no advertising or tracking cookies on this site.

3. Why it is used

• to provide counselling and keep appropriate professional records;
• to arrange, confirm, remind you about, move or cancel sessions, including automatic WhatsApp confirmations and reminders;
• to reply to your questions and messages;
• to meet professional, ethical and legal obligations, including professional supervision and safeguarding; and
• to keep the website and booking system secure and working properly.

Your information is processed with your consent, to provide the service you have asked for, and where the law requires it. It is never sold or used for marketing by anyone else.

4. Confidentiality and when information may be shared

Your counselling information is confidential. It may only be shared:

• with your informed consent, for example with another professional you are referred to;
• where there is a serious or immediate risk of harm to you or someone else;
• where there is reasonable concern that a child or a vulnerable or elderly person is at risk of abuse or neglect;
• where required by law, a court order or other lawful authority; or
• for professional supervision, with your identity withheld wherever reasonably possible.

Where reasonably possible, Gillian will discuss any disclosure with you first.

5. Service providers

A few trusted providers help run the website and booking system and only process your information on the practice’s behalf: a hosting provider for the website, a secure database and sign-in provider for your account and bookings, and WhatsApp (Meta) for messages, confirmations and reminders. Each is bound by its own security and privacy commitments.

6. Information stored outside South Africa

The website and booking database are hosted in Frankfurt, Germany, and WhatsApp messages are handled by Meta’s international systems. Germany is covered by the European Union’s General Data Protection Regulation, which gives protection at least equivalent to POPIA, as POPIA requires for transfers outside South Africa.

7. How it is kept safe

Access to your account and booking information is restricted so that you can only see your own details and only Gillian can see all clients’ bookings. Connections to the website are encrypted, and counselling records are stored securely. WhatsApp messages are end-to-end encrypted in transit, but no electronic communication can be guaranteed to be completely secure, so please avoid sending very sensitive details by message.

8. How long it is kept

Counselling records are kept for as long as professional, ethical and legal requirements say they must be, and then securely destroyed. Booking account details are kept while your account is in use; you can ask for your account to be closed at any time, subject to records that must be retained.

9. Your rights

Under POPIA you have the right to:

• ask what personal information is held about you and request a copy;
• ask for incorrect or out-of-date information to be corrected, or for information to be deleted where it no longer needs to be kept;
• object to your information being processed, and withdraw consent you have given; and
• lodge a complaint with the Information Regulator of South Africa (inforegulator.org.za).

You can update your name and WhatsApp number yourself in your profile. For anything else, message Gillian on 069 720 0442. You may be asked to confirm your identity first.

10. Changes to this policy

This policy may be updated from time to time; the date at the top shows the latest version. See also the terms & conditions.