Terms of use

The rules for using Therapy Circle, for people looking for help and for practitioners. Please read them with the privacy notice.

About the service

Therapy Circle is run by Dr Chia Barsen (see the privacy notice). It is a free directory of UK practitioners with a members’ area for practitioners. We do not provide therapy, clinical advice, bookings or payments, and we are not a party to any arrangement between a client and a practitioner.

The directory

Practitioners give their professional register and registration number when they join. We check the number’s format, they attest that it matches their entry on the public register, and a person looks each practitioner up on that register before their profile appears on the public Find page, and again each year. Listing is not an endorsement or recommendation. Before you start working with anyone, please check their entry on the register shown on their profile, and ask about their training, experience, insurance and fees. Profile information is written by the practitioner, and confirmation counts are anonymous and not a measure of quality.

Not a crisis service

Therapy Circle cannot respond to emergencies, and messages are not monitored for risk. If you need urgent help call NHS 111 and choose the mental health option, ring Samaritans free on 116 123, text Shout on 85258, or call 999 if life is at risk.

Who can use it

You must be 18 or over to send an introduction request or create an account. Practitioner membership is for people practising in the UK who are on a statutory register or a register accredited by the Professional Standards Authority, or who are members of a recognised professional body.

Practitioner members

• Your register details must be true and current, and you must tell us or update your profile if they change, lapse or become subject to conditions or suspension.
• Use only the titles you are entitled to use, and keep your profile accurate, including fees and availability.
• Follow your regulator’s and professional body’s code of conduct, and hold appropriate professional indemnity insurance.
• You are responsible for your own clinical work and your own data protection duties for any client who contacts you.
• Never post or message information that could identify a client.

Confirmations

Confirmations must be genuine. Invite only people you have actually worked with, never offer anything in return, never pressure a client, never create or ask for confirmations from yourself or anyone who has not worked with you, and follow your professional body’s guidance on testimonials. We may remove confirmations or the feature from a profile, and suspend an account, where we have reason to think these rules have been broken.

Acceptable use

Do not use Therapy Circle to post or send anything that is illegal, threatening, harassing, hateful, sexually explicit, misleading, defamatory, or that infringes someone’s rights; to impersonate anyone; to advertise unrelated services or send spam; to share someone else’s personal information without permission; or to try to break, scrape or overload the site.

Reporting and moderation

Anyone can report a profile, forum post or message through the contact form. We aim to acknowledge reports within 7 days, act faster where there may be a risk of harm or illegal content, and may remove content, hide a profile, or suspend or close an account. If we act on your content, you can ask us to review the decision through the same form. Illegal content may be reported to the police or the relevant authority. Signed-in members can also use the Report links in Messages, on profiles and in the forum, and can block another member from messaging them.

Protecting users from illegal content

We take proportionate steps to protect everyone who uses Therapy Circle from illegal content and activity, including fraud, impersonation, harassment, threats, terrorism content and any content that puts a child at risk. These steps include: looking up every practitioner on their public register before they appear on the public Find page, and again each year; reporting and blocking tools; prompt removal of illegal content once we know about it; suspending or closing accounts; and keeping a record of reports and what we did. Where content may be a crime or a risk to someone’s safety, we may pass it to the police, child protection services, Action Fraud, counter-terrorism policing or the relevant professional regulator. We have written an online safety risk assessment and review it at least once a year.

Complaints about posted content

If you think something on the site is defamatory about you, use the contact form and tell us: your name and how to contact you; where the content is; what it says and why you believe it is untrue or harmful; and whether you agree to your name and complaint being passed to the person who posted it. We will deal with it under the process set out in section 5 of the Defamation Act 2013 and the Defamation (Operators of Websites) Regulations 2013, which normally means contacting the poster and removing the content if they do not respond in time.

Ending your use

You can delete your account at any time from the Account page. We may suspend or remove an account or listing that breaks these terms, gives untrue register details, or puts others at risk, and we may change or stop the service. We will try to give notice where it is reasonable to do so.

Our responsibility

The service is free and provided as it is. We take care with the information on the site, but guides and links are general information, not medical or professional advice. We are not responsible for the services any practitioner provides, or for content posted by others. Nothing in these terms limits liability for death or personal injury caused by negligence, for fraud, or for anything else that cannot be limited by law, and nothing affects your statutory rights.

Changes and law

We may update these terms and will show the date of the latest version. These terms are governed by the law of England and Wales; if you live in Scotland or Northern Ireland you can also bring proceedings in your local courts.

Questions or complaints: use the contact form.

Last updated: 9 October 2026.