PRIVACY POLICY
Last updated: 12 August 2026
Maria K Claridge (“I”, “me”, “my”) respects your privacy and is committed to protecting your personal information.
This Privacy Policy explains how I collect, use, store and protect your personal information when you visit my website, contact me, make an enquiry, book or receive counselling, Personal Training, fitness or yoga services, attend a retreat, or otherwise communicate with me.
Because counselling involves particularly sensitive and confidential information, this Privacy Policy contains specific provisions about counselling enquiries, counselling records, mental-health information, confidentiality, clinical supervision, safeguarding and retention of counselling records.
I am the data controller responsible for your personal information.
1. WHO I AM
Maria K Claridge
Website: www.mariakclaridge.com
Email: mariakclaridge@gmail.com
If you have any questions about this Privacy Policy or how I handle your information, please contact me using the details above.
2. THE DIFFERENT SERVICES I PROVIDE
I provide a number of different services, which may include:
- Counselling.
- Personal Training.
- Fitness and exercise services.
- Yoga classes.
- Retreats and related wellbeing activities.
I recognise that counselling information is different in nature from information collected for fitness, yoga or retreat services.
Where you contact me specifically about counselling, the information you provide will be treated as counselling-related information and will not be used for general fitness, yoga, retreat or marketing purposes simply because you have contacted me.
Where possible, I will keep counselling records and communications separate from records relating to other services.
If you use more than one of my services, I may need to hold some basic administrative information across those services, such as your name and contact details. I will not combine counselling information with fitness or other service information unless there is a genuine and lawful reason to do so.
3. INFORMATION I MAY COLLECT
The information I collect depends on the service you are enquiring about or receiving.
General and administrative information
This may include:
- Your name.
- Email address.
- Telephone number.
- Address, where reasonably necessary.
- Booking and appointment information.
- Payment and transaction information.
- Information you provide when contacting me by email, telephone, website forms or other communication methods.
- Information relating to your attendance at my services.
- Website and technical information, such as IP address, browser type, device information and information about how you use my website, where collected.
Fitness, Personal Training, yoga and retreat information
Where relevant to those services, I may collect information about:
- Your fitness goals.
- Exercise history.
- Injuries.
- Medical conditions.
- Pregnancy or postpartum circumstances.
- Medications.
- Physical limitations.
- Other health information relevant to providing safe and appropriate exercise or movement services.
Counselling information
If you make a counselling enquiry or receive counselling from me, you may provide information that is considerably more sensitive.
This may include:
- Information disclosed when you first enquire about counselling.
- Information about why you are seeking counselling.
- Information about your circumstances, relationships, family or personal history.
- Information about your emotional wellbeing or mental health.
- Information concerning previous or current treatment or support.
- Information concerning trauma, abuse, bereavement, relationships or other personal circumstances.
- Information concerning suicidal thoughts, self-harm or risk where this is disclosed or becomes relevant to safeguarding.
- Information about medication or physical health where relevant to counselling.
- Information concerning safeguarding matters.
- Information discussed during counselling sessions.
- Information contained in counselling or therapy notes, if I maintain such notes.
- Administrative information relating to counselling appointments and communications.
Counselling information may include special-category personal data, particularly information concerning your physical or mental health.
I aim to collect only information that is reasonably necessary for the particular purpose for which it is collected.
4. COUNSELLING ENQUIRIES
If you contact me to enquire about counselling, I may collect and retain the information you provide in order to:
- Respond to your enquiry.
- Understand whether counselling is an appropriate service for your needs.
- Consider whether I am able to work with you safely and appropriately.
- Arrange an initial consultation or counselling appointment.
- Communicate with you about availability, appointments and practical arrangements.
- Consider any information relevant to safeguarding or immediate risk.
- Keep an appropriate record of the enquiry.
You should be aware that information disclosed during an initial counselling enquiry may itself be sensitive personal information, including information concerning mental health or other special-category data.
I will treat such information confidentially and will not automatically transfer it into my general fitness, Personal Training, yoga or retreat records.
Counselling enquiries are intended to be handled separately from general fitness or exercise enquiries. Information disclosed for counselling will not be used to create an exercise programme or provide fitness services unless you separately ask me to provide those services and the information is relevant to doing so.
If you decide not to proceed with counselling, I will retain information from your enquiry only for as long as reasonably necessary for the purposes described in this Privacy Policy, including any applicable legal, professional, insurance or record-keeping requirements.
5. HOW I USE COUNSELLING INFORMATION
Where you enquire about or receive counselling, I may use your information to:
- Respond to your counselling enquiry.
- Assess whether counselling with me is appropriate.
- Arrange and manage counselling appointments.
- Provide counselling services.
- Understand relevant background and circumstances.
- Maintain appropriate counselling records.
- Record relevant information arising during sessions where I consider a record necessary.
- Monitor and manage professional and safeguarding responsibilities.
- Obtain clinical supervision where appropriate.
- Respond to complaints or concerns.
- Deal with legal claims or legal obligations.
- Comply with applicable professional, legal, insurance or regulatory requirements.
- Protect you or another person where there is a serious and appropriate reason to disclose information.
I will not use counselling information for unrelated marketing purposes.
I will not use information disclosed during counselling to promote Personal Training, fitness, yoga, retreats or other services to you unless there is a separate lawful basis for doing so and the communication is appropriate.
6. COUNSELLING RECORDS AND SESSION NOTES
Counselling records may include administrative records, appointment information, relevant correspondence, assessment information, risk or safeguarding information and, where I consider it appropriate, notes relating to counselling sessions.
I do not necessarily record everything discussed during a counselling session.
If I maintain therapy or session notes, I will aim to ensure that they are:
- Accurate.
- Relevant.
- Adequate for the purpose for which they are kept.
- Limited to information that is reasonably necessary.
- Stored securely.
- Accessible only to people who have a legitimate reason to access them.
Counselling professionals are expected to keep records that are appropriate to the service being provided and compliant with applicable data-protection requirements.
Where possible, counselling contact details and identifying information will be kept separately from detailed counselling notes or records, or otherwise protected by appropriate access controls.
I will not make detailed counselling notes simply for the purpose of collecting more information than I reasonably need.
7. MENTAL-HEALTH AND SPECIAL-CATEGORY INFORMATION
Information concerning a person’s physical or mental health is special-category personal data under the UK GDPR and receives additional protection.
Where I process counselling information that constitutes special-category data, I will identify both:
- an appropriate lawful basis under Article 6 of the UK GDPR; and
- an appropriate condition under Article 9 of the UK GDPR.
The appropriate basis and condition will depend on the circumstances and the purpose for which the information is being processed.
Where appropriate, this may include explicit consent, but I will not assume that consent is automatically the appropriate legal basis for every aspect of counselling-related processing. The ICO makes clear that the appropriate lawful basis and special-category condition depend on the particular processing activity.
Where explicit consent is relied upon, it will be obtained through a clear affirmative statement and recorded appropriately.
I will only collect and use mental-health information that is relevant and reasonably necessary for the purpose for which it is collected.
8. CONFIDENTIALITY IN COUNSELLING
Confidentiality is an important part of the counselling relationship.
Information you share with me in counselling will normally be treated as confidential and will not normally be disclosed to other people without your knowledge and, where appropriate, your consent.
However, confidentiality is not absolute.
There may be circumstances in which I need to disclose information without your consent, or where I may be legally required or permitted to do so.
This may include circumstances such as:
- A serious and immediate concern about your safety.
- A serious and immediate concern about the safety of another person.
- Safeguarding concerns involving a child or vulnerable person.
- Where disclosure is required by law.
- Where I receive a valid court order or other legal requirement.
- Where disclosure is necessary to comply with a legal or professional obligation.
- Where disclosure is otherwise permitted or required in the public interest in circumstances recognised by law.
Where reasonably possible and appropriate, I will discuss a proposed disclosure with you before making it.
I will seek to disclose only information that is reasonably necessary for the particular purpose.
The existence of these limits to confidentiality will be explained as part of my counselling contracting and/or initial assessment process.
9. SAFEGUARDING AND EMERGENCY INFORMATION
During counselling, I may receive information indicating that there is a serious concern about the safety or welfare of you or another person.
This may include information relating to:
- Serious risk of harm to yourself.
- Serious risk of harm to another person.
- Abuse or neglect.
- Child safeguarding.
- Vulnerable adults.
- Other circumstances where safeguarding action may be necessary.
Where I consider that information needs to be shared to protect someone from serious harm or to comply with a legal or professional obligation, I may make an appropriate disclosure without your consent.
Where possible, I will discuss this with you first and explain what information I intend to share and why.
In an emergency, it may not be possible to discuss the disclosure with you beforehand.
Information concerning risk or safeguarding may therefore be recorded separately within your counselling records and may be retained for an appropriate period even where counselling does not continue.
10. CLINICAL SUPERVISION
As part of responsible counselling practice, I may discuss aspects of my counselling work with a qualified clinical supervisor.
Clinical supervision is intended to support safe, ethical and effective professional practice.
Where I discuss your work in supervision, I will aim to protect your confidentiality and will normally avoid identifying you unnecessarily.
Where possible, information discussed in supervision will be anonymised or sufficiently de-identified so that you are not identifiable.
However, complete anonymity cannot always be guaranteed where the circumstances are highly unusual or where the supervisor already has information that could identify you.
My supervisor will be subject to appropriate professional and confidentiality obligations.
I will not disclose more information than is reasonably necessary for effective supervision.
11. SHARING COUNSELLING INFORMATION WITH OTHER PEOPLE
I will not routinely share counselling information with family members, friends, employers, other clients or other service users.
I may share counselling information with third parties where there is an appropriate lawful basis or where disclosure is necessary or permitted for a particular purpose.
Depending on the circumstances, this may include:
- My clinical supervisor.
- Professional advisers.
- Insurers.
- Solicitors or legal advisers.
- Relevant healthcare or safeguarding professionals where necessary and lawful.
- Emergency services where necessary.
- Courts or other legal authorities where legally required.
- Government bodies or regulators where legally required.
- Service providers who process information on my behalf, such as secure email, cloud storage or booking providers.
I will seek to minimise the information shared and will take reasonable steps to ensure that any person or organisation receiving information has appropriate confidentiality and data-protection arrangements.
12. WHO I MAY SHARE MY OTHER INFORMATION WITH
For my other services, including Personal Training, fitness, yoga and retreats, I may share information where necessary with trusted third parties who help me operate my business.
These may include:
- Website hosting and technical providers.
- WordPress-related services, plugins and website providers.
- Email and communication providers.
- Booking and scheduling providers.
- Payment providers.
- Cloud storage providers.
- Accounting or bookkeeping providers.
- IT and technical support providers.
- Professional advisers, such as accountants, insurers or legal advisers.
- Government bodies, regulators or other authorities where I am legally required to do so.
I do not sell your personal information.
Where a third party processes personal information on my behalf, I will take reasonable steps to ensure that appropriate data-protection arrangements are in place.
13. WEBSITE, WORDPRESS AND ONLINE COMMUNICATIONS
My website, www.mariakclaridge.com, is built using WordPress.
WordPress itself, together with my website hosting provider, theme and plugins, may process technical information required to operate, maintain and secure the website.
The information collected by my website may depend on the particular plugins, services and features installed.
If I use online forms for counselling enquiries, I will take reasonable steps to ensure that counselling enquiries are handled appropriately and securely.
You should avoid including highly sensitive or unnecessary personal information in an ordinary website contact form unless I specifically ask you to provide it.
Where appropriate, I may invite counselling clients to communicate with me through a more suitable communication method.
My website may also contain links to third-party websites, including social-media platforms.
When you leave my website and visit a third-party website, that organisation’s own privacy policy will apply.
14. EMAIL, TELEPHONE, TEXT AND OTHER COMMUNICATIONS
If you contact me by email, telephone, text message or another communication method, I may retain relevant information from that communication where reasonably necessary.
For counselling clients, communications may contain sensitive information.
I will take reasonable steps to keep such communications secure and will avoid retaining unnecessary sensitive information.
Where a message contains information that is relevant to the counselling record, I may transfer the relevant information into the appropriate counselling record and delete the original message when it is no longer required, where appropriate.
You should be aware that ordinary email, text messaging and telephone systems may carry risks outside my direct control.
For particularly sensitive information, I may recommend using a more appropriate or secure method of communication.
15. MARKETING
Counselling information will not be used to send you marketing simply because you have made a counselling enquiry or received counselling.
I may occasionally contact existing or previous clients about services, classes, retreats or other relevant updates where I have a lawful basis to do so.
Where consent is required, I will ask for it.
You can opt out of marketing communications at any time.
You also have an absolute right to object to direct marketing.
16. COOKIES
My website may use cookies and similar technologies.
Some cookies may be necessary for the website to function correctly. Other cookies may be used for purposes such as analytics, functionality or embedded content.
The cookies used on my website depend on the WordPress theme, plugins and third-party services installed.
Where required by law, I will ask for your consent before using non-essential cookies.
17. INTERNATIONAL TRANSFERS
Some third-party technology and service providers used to operate my website or business may process personal information outside the UK.
Where personal information is transferred outside the UK, I will ensure that the transfer is made in accordance with applicable UK data-protection law and that appropriate safeguards are used where required.
Where relevant, these safeguards may include an adequacy decision or appropriate contractual safeguards.
18. HOW LONG I KEEP YOUR INFORMATION
I will not keep personal information for longer than is reasonably necessary for the purpose for which it was collected, unless I have a legal, professional, insurance or other legitimate reason to retain it for longer.
Different types of information may therefore be retained for different periods.
Counselling enquiries
I will normally retain information relating to a counselling enquiry for as long as reasonably necessary to deal with the enquiry and for any resulting counselling relationship, complaint, legal or professional requirement.
Where an enquiry does not result in counselling, I will normally review and securely delete the enquiry information after [insert period], unless there is a legitimate reason to retain it for longer.
Counselling client records
Where counselling takes place, I will retain relevant counselling records for seven years from the end of the counselling relationship, unless a different period is required or justified by my professional body, insurer, legal obligations, a complaint, safeguarding matter or other legitimate reason.
I will review the need for continued retention and securely delete or anonymise records when they are no longer required.
Important: this seven-year period should be checked against my current professional-body requirements, insurance arrangements and any applicable contractual or legal requirements before this policy is published.
Session or therapy notes
If I maintain session or therapy notes, they will normally be retained for the same period as the relevant counselling record unless there is a specific reason to apply a shorter or longer retention period.
I will not retain session notes indefinitely.
Safeguarding or risk information
Information relating to serious risk or safeguarding may need to be retained for an appropriate period where necessary to protect an individual, comply with professional obligations, respond to a complaint or legal matter, or demonstrate the actions taken.
Fitness and other client information
Relevant Personal Training, fitness, yoga and retreat information will be retained only for as long as reasonably necessary for the provision of those services and associated business, legal, insurance or record-keeping requirements.
Financial information
Certain financial and accounting records may need to be retained for longer periods to comply with legal and tax requirements.
Marketing information
Marketing information will be retained until you unsubscribe or withdraw your consent, where consent is the lawful basis, or until it is no longer reasonably necessary for the relevant purpose.
When information is no longer required, I will securely delete it or anonymise it where appropriate.
19. HOW I PROTECT YOUR INFORMATION
I take reasonable technical and organisational measures to protect your personal information against:
- Unauthorised access.
- Loss.
- Misuse.
- Alteration.
- Unauthorised disclosure.
I take particular care with counselling information, mental-health information and other sensitive information.
Measures may include appropriate passwords, access controls, secure storage, device security and restricting access to information to people who have a legitimate reason to access it.
No website, electronic storage system or method of transmission over the internet can be guaranteed to be completely secure.
20. YOUR DATA PROTECTION RIGHTS
Depending on the circumstances and applicable legal requirements, you may have the right to:
Right to be informed
You have the right to understand how and why your personal information is collected and used. This Privacy Policy provides that information.
Right of access
You can ask me for a copy of the personal information I hold about you.
This may include counselling records and other personal information, although legal exemptions may apply in certain circumstances.
Right to rectification
You can ask me to correct inaccurate or incomplete information.
Right to erasure
You can ask me to delete your personal information in certain circumstances.
This right is not absolute and may not apply where I have a legal, professional or other lawful reason to retain particular information.
Right to restrict processing
You can ask me to restrict how I use your information in certain circumstances.
Right to object
You can object to certain types of processing, including processing based on legitimate interests.
You have an absolute right to object to direct marketing.
Right to data portability
In certain circumstances, you can ask for personal information you have provided to me to be supplied in a structured, commonly used and machine-readable format or transferred to another organisation.
Right to withdraw consent
Where I rely on your consent to process your information, you can withdraw that consent at any time.
Withdrawal of consent does not affect processing that took place before consent was withdrawn and does not necessarily require information to be deleted where another lawful basis for retaining it applies.
These rights are subject to legal conditions and exemptions, so not every right will apply in every circumstance.
To exercise your rights, please contact:
Maria K Claridge
Email: mariakclaridge@gmail.com
I will normally respond to a valid request within one month.
21. YOUR RIGHT TO COMPLAIN TO THE ICO
I hope that I can resolve any privacy concerns directly with you.
However, you have the right to complain to the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) if you believe that I have handled your personal information unlawfully or have not respected your data-protection rights.
You can find information about making a complaint on the ICO’s website.
You can complain to the ICO without contacting me first.
However, I would appreciate the opportunity to resolve your concern directly where possible.
22. CHANGES TO THIS PRIVACY POLICY
I may update this Privacy Policy from time to time to reflect changes to my business, website, technology, services, counselling practice or data-protection requirements.
The latest version will always be published on this page with the date it was last updated.
23. CONTACT ME
If you have any questions about this Privacy Policy, how I use your information, counselling confidentiality, counselling records, or wish to exercise any of your data-protection rights, please contact me:
Maria K Claridge
Website: www.mariakclaridge.com
Email: mariakclaridge@gmail.com
Last updated: 12 August 2026