Terms of service

1. What this site is not

Everything on this website, the articles included, is general information written for a wide readership. It is not personal advice, it is not a diagnosis, and reading it does not make you my client. A counselling relationship begins when we have spoken and agreed to work together, not before.

Nothing here should be used in place of medical care. If you take medication, keep taking it and talk to the doctor who prescribed it rather than to a web page.

2. Who I am able to help

I am a counsellor and a PACFA Member. Counselling is a self-regulated profession in Australia, which means there is no AHPRA registration for it and the standards are set and enforced by the professional bodies instead. I have written about what that actually means rather than leaving you to guess.

There are things I am not. I am not a psychologist or a psychiatrist. I cannot diagnose a mental health condition, I cannot prescribe or advise on medication, and I cannot write a report that requires a registered psychologist's signature.

There is no Medicare rebate. This is a private practice, so the fee you see is the fee you pay. If a rebate is what you need, a GP mental health treatment plan pointing you to a psychologist is the right path, and I will say so plainly on the free call rather than let you find out later.

3. Booking and the free call

The first fifteen minutes are free and cost you nothing but the time. It is a conversation to work out whether I am the right person, not a session in miniature, and there is no obligation at the end of it. If I think someone else would serve you better I will say so and point you somewhere specific.

Sessions are booked through the calendar on this site or by agreeing a time directly with me. You will get a confirmation and a reminder. If a booking system ever double books you, that is my problem to fix and not yours to pay for.

4. Fees and payment

I am not registered for GST, so these are the whole amount. Nothing is added at the end and there is no GST component to claim back.

Payment is due on the day of the session. Language makes no difference to the fee, so a session in Spanish or French costs exactly what a session in English costs.

I do not run a formal concession scheme, but money should not be the reason somebody cannot start. If the fee is genuinely out of reach, tell me. With a current Centrelink concession card or student enrolment I can offer a reduced rate, agreed between us before we begin so there are no awkward surprises later.

If fees change I will tell existing clients at least one month beforehand. A change never applies to a session you have already booked.

5. Cancelling and missed sessions

More than twenty four hours notice and there is no charge at all. Move it, cancel it, no explanation needed. Ring, text or email, whichever is easiest.

Inside twenty four hours the full fee applies, and I want to explain why rather than simply assert it. That hour was held for you and nobody else could book it. In a one person practice a late cancellation is not an inconvenience, it is an hour that cannot be recovered.

The same applies if nobody arrives. After fifteen minutes I will treat the session as missed, though I will try to reach you first.

That said, life occasionally does something nobody planned for. A hospital admission, a death, a car accident. Tell me what happened and I will use my judgement, because a policy that cannot bend for a genuine emergency is not a policy worth having.

If I ever have to cancel on you, you owe nothing and I will offer you the first suitable slot I have.

6. Online sessions

Online sessions cost the same and run the same length. A few things are worth agreeing in advance.

• Find somewhere private where you will not be overheard. Headphones help more than people expect.
• I need to know where you are physically sitting at the start of each session, and a phone number that will reach you. If something serious happened mid session I would need to be able to get help to the right address.
• If the connection fails, ring me and we will finish by phone. A dropout is not a missed session and you will not be charged twice.
• Nothing is recorded, by either of us, unless we have both agreed to it in writing first.
• Online counselling suits a great many situations and not every one. If I think you would do better in the room, I will tell you.

7. Confidentiality

What you bring stays between us. There are four exceptions and they are the same four set out in the privacy policy, because an exception you have to hunt for is not really disclosed at all.

• A serious and imminent risk of harm to you or to someone else.
• A court order or subpoena requiring records.
• A reasonable belief that a child is being sexually abused, which Queensland law has required every adult in the state to report since July 2021.
• Your own written request, for instance a letter to your GP.

Outside those four, nothing leaves the room. We go through all of this properly in the first session and you will have the chance to ask about any part of it.

8. Working with under eighteens

Young people need to know where they stand before they will say anything real, so we settle it at the start, with the young person and the parent in the room together.

Broadly: what a teenager tells me is theirs, and I do not report the content of sessions back to a parent. What a parent can expect is a sense of how things are going and whether the work is helping. The exceptions above apply here as they do everywhere else, and I explain them to the young person in words that make sense at their age rather than reading them a policy.

Consent for a young person under eighteen generally comes from a parent or guardian. Where parents are separated, I ask that both be informed, and where there are court orders about who can consent to what I will need to see them before we begin.

I hold a current Blue Card and an NDIS Worker Screening Check.

9. Ending, pausing, referring on

You can stop whenever you like. No notice, no reason, no exit conversation unless you want one. You are not signing up to a course of anything and there is no minimum number of sessions.

If you want a break, take one. Tell me roughly when you might come back and I will hold the thread.

Occasionally I am the one who raises it. If what you are bringing sits outside what I am trained to work with, continuing would be a breach of my own code of ethics rather than a kindness. In that situation I will tell you clearly, explain why, and give you specific names rather than a vague suggestion to see someone else.

10. Workplace bookings

Organisations booking workshops or wellbeing work operate on a separate written agreement covering scope, dates, fees and travel, which we settle before anything is confirmed. A few things hold across all of them.

• A booking is confirmed when the agreement is signed and the deposit is paid. Dates are not held on a conversation.
• Cancel more than fourteen days out and the deposit is refunded. Inside fourteen days it is retained, because by then the date has been turned away from others.
• Travel and accommodation outside Brisbane are quoted separately and agreed in advance. Nothing appears on an invoice that you have not already seen.
• What individuals say in a workshop does not go back to the employer. Assessment reporting is at group level, and where a group is small enough that individuals could be identified I will say so before we start rather than after.
• Materials I bring stay mine. You are welcome to use them inside your organisation and not to resell or publish them.
• I carry public liability and professional indemnity insurance. Certificates are available if your procurement people need them.

11. Using this website

The words, images and articles here are mine. Quote a paragraph with a link back by all means, that is how the internet is supposed to work. Republishing whole articles is not on.

The starting point quiz is an orientation tool and nothing more. It does not assess you, it does not screen you, and it produces no score. It suggests where on the site to look next, and that is the whole of its ambition.

Links out to other organisations are there because they are useful. I do not control those sites and I am not responsible for what they say.

I keep this site accurate and available, but I cannot promise it will never be wrong or never be down. Where Australian Consumer Law gives you guarantees that cannot be excluded, nothing on this page tries to exclude them.

12. Complaints and the law

If something about how I have worked with you does not sit right, tell me. Most of it is fixable and I would rather hear it from you than not hear it at all.

If you would rather go elsewhere, PACFA takes complaints about its members and the process is published on their website. You do not need my agreement and you do not need to tell me you are doing it.

These terms are governed by the law of Queensland, Australia.

If I update them, the date below changes. Where a change affects a client I am already working with, I will tell them directly rather than expecting them to check a web page.