Privacy

Privacy policy

Freedom Hypnosis is the practice of Simon Bates, working from West Norwood, south London, and online. If you want a copy of what I hold, a correction, or deletion, email simon@freedomhypnosis.co.uk or call 07968 399414.

Confidentiality

Confidentiality is maintained except in the most exceptional circumstances. Those are a court order demanding disclosure, including a coroner’s court, and where there is good cause to believe that not disclosing would put someone else in danger of serious harm. Your contact details are not released to third parties without your permission.

Sharing an anonymous case history with a supervisor or a peer-support group is not a breach of that confidentiality. Sharing an open case history with a supervisor, or with an NHS practitioner who referred you, is not a breach either. I do not pass client details to directories.

What I collect

To arrange sessions and keep your details current I hold your name, address if you give it, phone number and email, the texts and emails we exchange, and the dates of your sessions.

• The contact form: your name, email, phone if you give it, the concern, the kind of session, and your message. The form is sent to my email by FormSubmit. I do not keep a separate database of form entries.
• Bookings: Acuity Scheduling stores the appointment and the details you type there, including name, email and phone.
• Email, phone and WhatsApp: I keep the correspondence so I can reply and do the work.
• Session notes, so I can follow your progress. After a session I keep a brief record of the focus and the primary interventions used. I also keep the pertinent points from the session: outcomes, problems, emotional responses, life events, improvements and how you responded to the work, plus whatever else is useful to the result. These notes are kept without your name, and only on encrypted devices and cloud servers. Paper records are destroyed. They are clinical notes, not a transcript of everything said.
• IAPT scores, where we use them: GAD-7 for anxiety, PHQ-9 for depression, and SWEMWBS for wellbeing.

Why, and for how long

I use this to answer you, arrange sessions, follow the work, and keep a record of it. I do not sell it. Unless you ask for it to be deleted after treatment, I keep it for eight years. That follows advice from the CNHC, so I can help you if you come back, and so I have what is needed for an HMRC enquiry. You can ask me to delete what I am not required to keep.

Occasional updates

From time to time I may use your contact details to send infrequent articles, a newsletter, or news of a workshop, talk or event. You can unsubscribe, or ask to be removed, at any time. That list may be held by a mailing service such as Mailchimp, or another service with strong data protection.

Who else sees it

FormSubmit or, if that service is unavailable, ShipMyForm delivers the contact form and the mood questionnaire. Acuity holds bookings. Your own email or WhatsApp provider carries messages you send that way. A mailing service holds the list only if you are on it. Apart from the confidentiality exceptions above, I do not pass client details to other therapists or to directories. Google Analytics records which pages are visited and how people arrived. It uses a cookie. It does not receive your name or what you type in the contact form.

You can complain to the Information Commissioner’s Office at ico.org.uk if you believe I have not kept your data properly or have broken this agreement. This page was last updated in October 2026.