Privacy & Ethics:
Our Commitment to You

Alliance Clinical Consulting operates within rigorous professional and legal frameworks through dual registration with the Health and Care Professions Council (HCPC) and the British Psychological Society (BPS). The BPS Code of Ethics and Conduct provides four core principles that guide every aspect of your care whilst HCPC Standards of Conduct, Performance and Ethics provide statutory safeguards.

Our Ethical Framework

The BPS Code establishes four core ethical principles: respect, competence, responsibility, and integrity. These principles shape how your assessment or therapy proceeds and how information about you remains protected. Regular supervision and continuing professional development maintain clinical competence whilst voluntary (BPS) and statutory (HCPC) registration provide overlapping safeguards for your welfare.

The Four Ethical Principles

Respect requires that your autonomy, privacy, dignity and cultural context receive full consideration. You make informed decisions based on clear information about what different approaches involve. Your personal values and circumstances shape how therapy proceeds. The principle recognises that you possess expertise about your own life.

Competence ensures you receive services only within established areas of training and expertise. Ongoing professional development maintains current knowledge. When your needs fall outside existing competence areas, appropriate referral occurs. Competence requires recognition of personal limitations and seeking consultation when situations present complexity.

Responsibility emphasises duty to protect your welfare whilst considering broader societal obligations. Your interests take precedence except where serious harm requires intervention. The principle recognises the power differential in therapeutic relationships and requires that professional influence never becomes exploitative. Responsibility includes maintaining professional boundaries and recognising when personal factors might compromise judgement.

Integrity demands honesty, accuracy and consistency between stated values and actual practice. You receive truthful information about qualifications, experience and the limits of what particular approaches can achieve. Integrity means acknowledging uncertainty rather than offering false reassurance and maintaining ethical standards even when inconvenient. The principle requires transparency about fees, cancellation policies and potential conflicts of interest.

Confidentiality in Practice

Information you share during assessment or therapy remains confidential within clearly defined limits. Clinical records remain secure with access restricted to the practitioner involved in your care. Written notes contain only clinically relevant information.

Electronic records receive password protection with encrypted storage meeting current security standards. Paper records remain in locked storage. When supervision occurs to support clinical work, information shared with supervisors remains subject to the same confidentiality requirements whilst identifying details undergo removal where possible.

You control whether anyone else receives information about your involvement with the service. Contact with family members, GPs or other professionals only occurs with your explicit written consent except where legal obligations override confidentiality.

We prioritise confidentiality and discretion: rather than publishing extensive public outcome data, we focus on safeguarding client privacy and maintaining trust in every therapeutic relationship.

Data Protection and GDPR

Alliance Clinical Consulting processes personal data in accordance with GDPR and the Data Protection Act 2018. Your personal data includes contact information, appointment records, clinical notes and assessment reports. Processing occurs lawfully under legitimate interests for therapeutic work or under explicit consent for specific purposes such as information sharing.

Clinical records remain stored for seven years following your last contact with the service, meeting BPS and HCPC professional guidance. Assessment reports you receive become your property, though the practice retains copies for the same period. Correspondence and administrative records undergo review with non-essential materials removed.

You hold rights to access your records, request corrections to inaccurate information, and in some circumstances request deletion. Your records remain portable, meaning you can request transfer to another provider. Response to these requests occurs within one month unless complexity requires extension. Should you feel data protection obligations have not been met, you possess the right to lodge complaints with the Information Commissioner’s Office.

Limits to Confidentiality

Confidentiality operates within legal and ethical boundaries that occasionally require information disclosure. You receive clear explanation of these limits before beginning work together.

Legal obligations sometimes necessitate breaching confidentiality without consent. Court orders compelling disclosure require compliance. Safeguarding concerns involving children or vulnerable adults trigger reporting duties to appropriate authorities. Terrorism prevention legislation imposes specific disclosure requirements in defined circumstances.

Professional judgement about serious harm risk might necessitate breaking confidentiality to protect you or others. Such decisions involve consultation with supervisors or professional bodies before action. Where possible, you receive notification before disclosure occurs unless doing so would increase risk.

Insurance work or legal assessments often require reports to third parties. You receive explicit explanation of who will receive information before assessment begins. The scope of information shared remains limited to what the referrer legitimately requires.

Working with Organisations

Organisational work maintains the same ethical standards as individual clinical services. Clarity about roles, responsibilities and confidentiality boundaries occurs before work commences.

Contracts specify what information the organisation receives and what remains confidential to individuals. When assessing employees or candidates, you receive explicit explanation of what feedback the organisation will obtain. Your consent to this arrangement forms a prerequisite for proceeding.

Training services maintain participant confidentiality regarding personal disclosures. Organisations receive feedback about training delivery and learning outcomes rather than information about individual participants unless serious concerns emerge.

Organisational relationships never compromise individual welfare. Should conflicts arise between organisational interests and individual needs, ethical principles take precedence. Clear boundaries prevent dual relationships where organisational and individual therapeutic roles might conflict.

Your Rights and Expectations

You can expect honest, competent services delivered with respect for your dignity and autonomy. When concerns about ethical practice arise, you possess the right to raise these directly with the practitioner or through formal complaints processes with the BPS or HCPC. Both organisations maintain independent investigation procedures that can result in practitioner sanctions including conditions on practice or removal from professional registers.

You control your engagement with services and can pause or end work at any point. Financial obligations remain limited to services already provided under agreed terms. Professional boundaries mean the relationship remains focused on your therapeutic or assessment needs.

Informed consent requires clear information about proposed approaches, potential benefits and risks, alternative options, and likely costs before agreeing to proceed. Consent remains an ongoing process with opportunities to revise decisions as circumstances change. Your questions receive direct answers in accessible language.

Maintaining Trust

Ethical practice and privacy protection extend beyond regulatory compliance to form the foundation of therapeutic effectiveness. You cannot engage openly whilst concerned about how information might be used or whether professional standards will be maintained. Trust develops through consistent adherence to stated principles.

The professional frameworks described here protect your interests whilst ensuring competent support. When ethical dilemmas arise, consultation with supervisors and professional bodies ensures decisions reflect established principles. Your welfare remains the primary consideration guiding clinical judgement and professional conduct.