Career Path Counselling is committed to complying with the terms of the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) and to the responsible and secure use of your personal data. CPC has a legitimate interest in processing personal data in order to provide career counselling services. The purpose of this statement is to let you know what personal information CPC collects and holds, why we collect this data, how long it is kept and your rights over it. CPC is registered with the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO), ref no ZA796279 .

1. Information about you

1.1 We collect personal information from you when you enquire about our counselling services in order to set up a call or appointment. This information includes contact details (although we do not usually request your home address), your availability and other relevant personal information. This information is only held within the email and phone messages between us, and is deleted every 18 months.

1.2 More detailed information that you send us during your counselling sessions, such as work history, completed questionnaires and exercises, is stored in three places:

a. In our cloud-based (OneDrive) virtual filing cabinet which is protected by encryption.

b. Within 3 months of finishing your counselling sessions, your data will also be located on the computer hard drive in the CPC office. All client files are password protected and clients are only referred to by their first name. After 3 months the information is deleted from here and only held in the cloud.

c. On our online portal Mural. Information on Mural is held for 6 months in case a client wishes to reaccess it, then it is deleted unless the client requests otherwise. Mural is a highly secure environment, more details here: https://www.mural.co/security/overview. After 6 months copies of Mural data are transferred in pdf form to our secure OneDrive cloud. 

1.3 Once a client finishes counselling, all data regarding their sessions is stored securely for up to 2 years and then destroyed, digital data is deleted and hard copies are shredded.

2. Our use of this information

2.1 Your personal information will be used only to provide you with our services and to give you information relating to our services. We will not share your personal details with any other person or organisation without your knowledge and permission, unless there is a legal requirement, if there is a child or adult safeguarding issue, or a perceived risk of harm. 

3. Payment information

3.1 All of our clients' bank details and other payment information is held by Stripe, no local copies are stored. Details here: hthttps://stripe.com/en-gb/legal/privacy-center 

4. Security

4.1 We will take all reasonable precautions to prevent the loss, misuse or alteration of information you give us. If there is any possibillity that your data may have been seen or handled by any third party, we will inform you immediately.

4.2 Communications in connection with this service may be sent by e-mail. For ease of use and compatibility, communications will not be sent in an encrypted form unless you require it and give us permission to communicate with you in that way. E-mail, unless encrypted, is not a fully secure means of communication. Whilst we endeavour to keep our systems and communications protected against viruses and other harmful effects, we cannot bear responsibility for all communications being virus-free.