Terms and Conditions

Last updated: 30 July 2026

These terms apply when you book or receive counselling from Health by Science. Please read section 3 before booking, because we offer counselling in two ways and you choose which one you want.

Counselling is not an emergency service. If you are in crisis or you are not safe, contact 999, NHS 24 on 111, Samaritans on 116 123 or Breathing Space on 0800 83 85 87. We cannot respond to urgent messages between sessions.

1. Who we are

Health by Science Ltd CIC, a Community Interest Company registered in Scotland.

• Company number: SC557048
• Registered office: 98 Giles Street, Leith, Edinburgh, EH6 6BZ
• Company type: private company limited by guarantee, registered as a Community Interest Company

Counselling sessions take place at 100 Giles Street, Leith, Edinburgh, EH6 6BZ, and online by video call.

• Email: hello@healthbyscience.co.uk
• Telephone: 0131 210 0002

Where these terms say “we”, “us” or “our”, we mean Health by Science Ltd CIC. Your counselling is delivered by a counsellor working with us, and we remain responsible to you for the service.

We hold professional indemnity and public liability insurance. Details are available on request.

2. About these terms

You accept these terms when you confirm a booking. We will send you a copy with your booking confirmation.

At your first session you will also be asked to read and sign a Counselling Agreement. That covers confidentiality and its limits, how we handle risk, what to expect from the work and how it ends. These terms cover the commercial side: fees, booking and cancellation. Both apply.

Nothing in these terms affects your legal rights as a consumer.

3. The two ways we offer counselling

Counselling with an experienced counsellor. Sessions with Lucy Wren, an accredited registrant of the National Counselling and Psychotherapy Society. Available in person and online, for individuals and couples.

Service	Format	Length	Fee
Introductory chat	Phone or video	15 minutes	Free
Individual counselling	In person, Leith	50 minutes	£60
Individual counselling	Online, UK-wide	50 minutes	£50
Couples counselling	In person, Leith	60 minutes	£80
Couples counselling	Online, UK-wide	60 minutes	£70

Low-cost counselling with a counsellor on placement. Sessions with a counsellor who is completing their professional training and is on supervised placement with us. They are working towards qualification, they receive regular clinical supervision from our counselling lead, at a minimum of one hour of supervision for every six hours of client work, and their practice is overseen by us and by their training provider. A qualified practitioner is available throughout whenever a counsellor on placement is seeing clients at our premises.

Service	Format	Length	Fee
Individual counselling	In person, Leith	50 minutes	£30

Available in person only, at 100 Giles Street, and for individuals rather than couples. Individual sessions last 50 minutes and couples sessions last 60 minutes.

We tell you which of these you are booking before you book, not afterwards. If the low-cost service is not available to you because you need online sessions or couples work, tell us and we will discuss what we can do.

Free introductory call. Before you book anything, you can have a free 15-minute call with us to talk about what you are looking for and which route suits you. There is no charge and no obligation.

What counselling is not. Counselling is not medical treatment. We do not diagnose conditions or prescribe medication, and counselling does not replace care from your GP or a mental health service. If you are receiving other treatment, we will usually suggest you tell whoever is providing it that you are having counselling.

4. Booking and payment

How a booking is made. You enquire through the form on our website or by telephone. We will talk with you about which service fits, and then offer you an appointment. Your booking is confirmed, and the contract between us begins, when we send you a booking confirmation by email.

Payment. Payment is taken in full at the time of booking, processed by Stripe. We do not see or store your full card details.

Cards held on file. With your written permission we may store your card securely so that we can take payment for future sessions when you ask us to. We will not charge a stored card without your agreement, and you can withdraw that permission at any time.

Prices. The price that applies is the price shown when you book. If we change our prices we will give you at least 30 days’ notice before it affects sessions you have not yet booked.

VAT. We are not registered for VAT. No VAT is charged on our prices.

5. Your legal right to cancel a booking

Because bookings are made online or by telephone, they are distance contracts, and you have a legal right to cancel under the Consumer Contracts (Information, Cancellation and Additional Charges) Regulations 2013.

The 14-day period. You have 14 days, starting the day after we confirm your booking, to change your mind and cancel for a full refund. You do not need to give a reason.

This right sits above our own cancellation policy. If you cancel within the 14-day period and before your session has taken place, you are entitled to a full refund. That applies even if you cancel with less than 48 hours’ notice and would otherwise fall within the late cancellation policy in section 6.

If your session falls inside the 14 days. By booking a session that takes place within 14 days of your booking, you are expressly asking us to start providing the service before the end of the cancellation period. You can still cancel, but if we have already provided part of the service we may charge a proportionate amount for what has been provided, and once a session has taken place you lose the right to cancel that session.

How to cancel. Tell us clearly that you want to cancel, by emailing hello@healthbyscience.co.uk, telephoning 0131 210 0002 or writing to us at 98 Giles Street, Leith, Edinburgh, EH6 6BZ. You can use the form at the end of these terms, but you do not have to.

Refunds. We will refund you within 14 days of the day we are told you want to cancel, to the payment method you used.

6. Cancelling, rearranging and missed sessions

This applies to sessions where the right in section 5 does not apply or has ended. Where section 5 applies, section 5 wins.

Notice we ask for. At least 48 hours if you need to cancel or move a session.

48 hours’ notice or more. No charge. We will move your session or refund you, whichever you prefer.

Less than 48 hours, or not attending. The full fee is payable and we will not refund it. Your session time is held for you and cannot be offered to anyone else at short notice.

Discretion. Where there is a good reason for a late cancellation, including sudden illness, an emergency, a bereavement or severe weather, we will waive the charge. Tell us what has happened. We apply this reasonably and consistently, but the decision is ours.

Missed sessions without contact. Counselling depends on regular attendance. If you miss two sessions without telling us, we will contact you to see whether you want to continue. If we do not hear back, we may end the work and offer your slot to someone else. We will always write to you first.

If you are late. Your session will still finish at its scheduled end time, because the counsellor will have someone booked after you.

If we cancel. If we have to cancel or move a session we will tell you as soon as we can and offer you an alternative time or a refund. If your counsellor becomes unavailable for a longer period, we will talk to you about whether to pause the work, transfer to another counsellor, or end and refund anything you have paid for sessions not yet had.

7. Counselling with a counsellor on placement

What placement means. Your counsellor is completing a recognised professional training and is working towards qualification. They are on supervised placement with us. They receive regular clinical supervision from our counselling lead, an accredited registrant of the National Counselling and Psychotherapy Society, at a minimum of one hour of supervision for every six hours of client work, and their training provider also oversees their practice. A qualified practitioner is available throughout whenever a counsellor on placement is seeing clients at our premises. We tell you all of this before you book, and you can ask who your counsellor is and where they are training.

Supervision and who sees your information. All counsellors, qualified or in training, discuss their work in clinical supervision. For counsellors on placement, their supervisor and their training provider may also see information about the work. What that means in practice is explained in your Counselling Agreement, and you will be asked to confirm you understand it before you start.

Commitment. Placement work is usually offered as a block of regular weekly sessions rather than occasional appointments, because it needs continuity to be useful. We will agree the shape of it with you at the start.

How long a placement lasts. Placements run until a counsellor has completed the clinical hours their training requires, rather than for a fixed number of months, so the end date depends partly on how quickly those hours build up. We will tell you at the outset roughly how long we expect your counsellor to be with us, and we will give you as much notice as we can if the work needs to end or transfer. If your counsellor has to stop unexpectedly, we will offer you a transfer to another counsellor where we can, or a refund for sessions paid for and not had.

Suitability. Not every situation is appropriate for a counsellor in training. We assess this before we allocate you, and we may tell you that the low-cost route is not suitable and offer you an alternative. That is a clinical judgement made in your interests.

7A. Clinical supervision for counsellors

We also offer clinical supervision to counsellors and trainee counsellors outside our own service, provided by Lucy Wren at £60 per hour.

Supervision is a professional service bought by a practitioner for their own practice, not counselling, and these terms apply to it only in part. Sections 4, 5 and 6 apply to booking, payment and cancellation. Sections 7, 8 and 9 do not.

What supervision is not. Supervision is not therapy for the supervisee, and it does not create any relationship between us and the supervisee’s own clients. The supervisee remains responsible for their own practice, their own record keeping and their own insurance.

Confidentiality. What is brought to supervision is treated confidentially, subject to the same limits set out in section 9, and subject to the supervisor’s own professional obligations where a concern arises about a supervisee’s practice or about the safety of a supervisee’s client.

Reports and confirmations. Where a training provider or professional body requires confirmation of supervision hours, we will provide it. Anything beyond a factual record of attendance will be discussed with the supervisee first.

If you are buying supervision as a business. Where a supervisee is contracting in the course of their own business rather than as a consumer, the consumer rights described in sections 5 and 11 do not apply, and the cancellation terms in section 6 apply as agreed rather than subject to consumer fairness rules.

8. Whether counselling is right for you

Before you start we will talk with you about what you are looking for and whether we are the right service.

When we may not be able to help. Sometimes what someone needs is different from what we offer, or more than we can safely provide. Where that is the case we will say so, explain why, and help you find something more suitable. We may do this before the work starts or during it. Where we decline before a session has taken place, we will refund you.

If we are worried about your safety. Your counsellor will talk to you about it first wherever it is possible and safe to do so. In some circumstances we will need to take action to keep you or someone else safe, including contacting your GP, emergency services or, where a child or an adult at risk is involved, the relevant authority. Your Counselling Agreement explains this properly, and it is one of the things you should read before you start.

Telling us what is going on. Please give us accurate information about your health, medication and anything else that affects the work, and tell us if it changes.

Under-18s. We do not currently offer counselling to anyone under 18.

9. Confidentiality

What you bring to counselling is confidential, and there are limits to that which you need to know before you start. They include clinical supervision, concern about serious risk to you or to someone else, child protection and adult protection duties, and situations where the law requires disclosure.

This is set out in full in your Counselling Agreement, which you will read and sign at your first session. If you would like to see it before you book, ask and we will send it to you.

10. Professional standards and complaints

Counselling is not a statutorily regulated profession in the United Kingdom, and counsellor is not a protected title. Our counselling lead, Lucy Wren, is an accredited registrant of the National Counselling and Psychotherapy Society (NCPS), which holds an Accredited Register overseen by the Professional Standards Authority. She works to the NCPS Code of Ethical Practice, and counsellors on placement work to the ethical framework of their training body as well as to ours.

If something goes wrong. Please tell us. Often the most useful thing is to raise it with your counsellor directly, and we would encourage that where you feel able to.

Our complaints procedure.

1. Send your complaint to hello@healthbyscience.co.uk, or by post to 98 Giles Street, Leith, Edinburgh, EH6 6BZ.
2. We will acknowledge it within 5 working days.
3. We will investigate and respond in writing within 20 working days. If we need longer we will tell you why and when to expect a response.
4. If you are not satisfied, you can ask for a review by a company director who has not been involved.

We will not treat you differently, or stop working with you, because you have complained.

If your complaint concerns the conduct of an NCPS registrant and you are not satisfied with our response, you can raise it with the NCPS directly through its complaints procedure. If your complaint concerns a counsellor on placement, you can also raise it with their training provider, and we will tell you who that is.

11. Our responsibility to you

What we always remain responsible for. Nothing in these terms limits or excludes our liability for:

• death or personal injury caused by our negligence, or the negligence of our employees, agents or subcontractors
• fraud or fraudulent misrepresentation
• breach of your legal rights in relation to our services, including the right to have services carried out with reasonable care and skill
• anything else that cannot lawfully be limited or excluded

The standard we work to. We will provide counselling with reasonable care and skill, as required by section 49 of the Consumer Rights Act 2015. If we do not, you have the right to ask us to put it right, and if we cannot do that within a reasonable time and without significant inconvenience to you, to a reduction in price.

Outcomes. Counselling is not a treatment with a guaranteed result. We cannot promise a particular outcome, a timescale, or that you will feel better by a given point, and any counsellor who does promise that should not be believed. Counselling can also be uncomfortable, particularly early on. None of this reduces our duty to work with reasonable care and skill.

Foreseeable loss. We are responsible for loss or damage you suffer that is a foreseeable result of us breaking this contract or failing to use reasonable care and skill. We are not responsible for loss or damage that is not foreseeable.

Business use. We provide counselling for personal use. If you use it for any commercial purpose, we will have no liability for loss of profit, loss of business, business interruption or loss of business opportunity.

12. Your part in it

We ask that you attend sessions you have booked, arrive on time, tell us in good time if you cannot make it, and treat your counsellor and our staff with respect.

We do not accept abusive, threatening or discriminatory behaviour. Where that happens we may end a session and end the work. If we do, we will refund anything you have paid for sessions not yet had, and we will tell you why in writing.

Please do not record sessions. We do not record them either.

13. Materials we give you

Any written material, exercises or resources we give you during counselling are for your own personal use. They remain our property or that of their authors, and should not be redistributed, sold or used commercially.

14. Your information

We handle your personal information, including everything you tell us in counselling, in line with UK data protection law. Our Privacy Policy explains what we collect, why, how long we keep it, who sees it and what rights you have. You can read it at healthbyscience.co.uk/privacy.

15. Changes to these terms

We may update these terms from time to time. The version that applies to your booking is the version published when you made that booking. The date at the top tells you when we last made a change.

16. Governing law

These terms are governed by the law of Scotland, and any dispute can be brought before the Scottish courts. If you live elsewhere in the United Kingdom, you keep the benefit of any consumer protections that apply where you live, and you can bring proceedings in your local courts.

17. Contact us

• Email: hello@healthbyscience.co.uk
• Telephone: 0131 210 0002
• Post: Health by Science Ltd CIC, 98 Giles Street, Leith, Edinburgh, EH6 6BZ

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Cancellation form

You can use this form to cancel under section 5, but you do not have to. Any clear statement that you want to cancel is enough.

To: Health by Science Ltd CIC, 98 Giles Street, Leith, Edinburgh, EH6 6BZ, hello@healthbyscience.co.uk

I hereby give notice that I cancel my contract for the supply of the following service:

Service booked: …………………………………………………..

Date of session: …………………………………………………..

Date of booking: …………………………………………………..

Your name: …………………………………………………..

Your address: …………………………………………………..

Signature (only if sending this form on paper): …………………………………………………..

Date: …………………………………………………..