Frequently asked questions

Anxiety UK Approved Therapists are volunteers and are not employed by Anxiety UK. The fees that members pay direct to them, help cover expenses such as external supervision and room hire.

All Anxiety UK Approved Therapists have a current Enhanced Disclosure and Barring Service (DBS) check and undergo a thorough screening process before joining the Anxiety UK Approved Therapist team. All Anxiety UK Approved Therapists must be in receipt of regular external clinical supervision,  have up to date and relevant qualifications, maintain their membership of a professional body, hold  professional indemnity insurance cover and maintain their Continuing Professional Development (CPD).

Please note that some of our Anxiety UK Approved Therapists  may be in the process of completing their training. If you do not wish to be allocated to a Anxiety UK Approved Therapist who is completing their training, please make this clear in your therapy referral form or  email [email protected]

Regular quality assurance checks are carried out to ensure that all Anxiety UK Approved Therapists meet the above stringent requirements.

Counsellors must hold a Diploma in Counselling from a course that has been accredited/is in the process of being accredited by either the British Association for Counselling & Psychotherapy (BACP), the British Psychological Society (BPS) or the National Counselling Society (NCS) and/or hold individual registration/accreditation with the BACP or NCS.

Alternatively, if counsellors hold a Counselling diploma from a non-BACP, NCS or BPS accredited course, they must be working towards securing BACP, NCS or BPS accreditation within 12 months of being accepted as an Anxiety UK Approved Therapist.

CBT practitioners must hold a qualification from a course that has been accredited /is in the process of being accredited by the British Association for Behavioural & Cognitive Psychotherapies (BABCP) and/or hold individual accreditation with the BABCP.

Alternatively, if CBT practitioners have a Diploma or higher qualification in CBT (including a dual Diploma in CBT/REBT)  from a non-BABCP accredited course, they must be working towards securing BABCP accreditation within 12 months of being accepted as an Anxiety UK Approved Therapist.

Clinical Hypnotherapists must hold a Diploma in Clinical Hypnotherapy and be registered with one of the following professional bodies: The Complementary and Natural Healthcare Council, The British Society of Clinical Hypnosis, the General Hypnotherapy Register, National Council for Hypnotherapy, UK Council for Psychotherapy and The Hypnotherapy Society.

CFT practitioners must have completed Anxiety UK’s CPD 3 day Introduction to CFT training course or an equivalent CPD 3 day introduction course equivalent to the AUK course delivered by a provider recognised by the Compassionate Mind Foundation. Alternatively practitioners must have completed an Advanced Clinical Skills training course in CFT from a provider recognised by the Compassionate Mind Foundation, or hold either a PG Cert or PG Diploma in CFT from a provider recognised by the Compassionate Mind Foundation.

EMDR practitioners must have completed or be in the process currently undertaking EMDR Europe training and be able to provide documentation of training certificates and/or be accredited with EMDR Europe.

To access Anxiety UK’s therapy services, you must:

• Be aged 18 years and over
• Have an active membership subscription of Anxiety UK. If you access therapy when your membership has expired, you will be required to pay the full private rate (circa £60-150 per session depending upon your area of residence) for the sessions received, and you will be invoiced directly by Anxiety UK.
• Be requiring support with anxiety, stress or anxiety-based depression and be “ready, willing & able” to fully engage with talking therapy, including being able to commit to attending regular appointments.
• Be registered with a GP at all times. We will not be able to offer therapy support if you are not registered with a GP or are unwilling to provide your GP’s name and contact details.

Anxiety UK’s therapy services are not/may not be suitable if:

• You have an alcohol/drug issue that is at a level which is highly likely to interfere with your ability to engage fully with therapy.
• You have a diagnosis of another more complex mental health condition such as psychosis or an emerging personality disorder or personality disorder (including borderline personality disorder). Please note, having such mental health issues does not always result in you being unable to access our therapy services.  In such circumstances, we routinely contact other relevant professionals involved in your care to obtain their opinion as to whether our therapy services are suitable.  Please note, hypnotherapy is unlikely to be suitable in such circumstances.
• You have strong thoughts of suicide and we believe you may be at risk. In such circumstances we routinely contact your GP and/or other relevant health professional to ensure it is safe and appropriate for you to access our therapy services.

Please note that whilst we work outside of the NHS, in the above-mentioned circumstances, we will always act on the advice of mental health professional or GP to determine whether our therapy services are appropriate for you. We will not offer therapy or a modality of therapy where a GP/health care professional has advised it to be inappropriate.

The length of the session depends on the type of therapy you have, however, generally each counselling, CBT, CFT or clinical hypnotherapy session will usually last around 50-60 minutes and will typically be held on a weekly basis. The usual length of EMDR session is 60-90 minutes and will typically be held on a weekly basis.

Typically a course of clinical hypnotherapy or CFT will be 4-6 sessions.  A course of CBT or counselling will be around 6-15 sessions and EMDR between 8-12.  However as every individual is unique, in a situation where it is felt that you would benefit from further sessions, your Anxiety UK Approved Therapist will discuss this matter with you and their external clinical supervisor to determine an appropriate way forward.

Your membership entitles you to access therapy at a reduced cost.  How much you pay per session is determined by your total annual household income before tax. Please contact our referrals team via [email protected] if you have any special circumstances we need to be aware of. More information about therapy fees can be found here.

Please note that if your household income changes at any point during your therapy interaction, you must inform Anxiety UK.

Anxiety UK collect and retain payments for the first, second and last session (or first and last in the case of Clinical hypnotherapy). Pay for your therapy fees here. Further session fees are payable directly to your Anxiety UK Approved Therapist.

Anxiety UK do not offer free taster sessions. 

Anxiety UK’s therapy services team process your therapy referral and communicate with our team of Anxiety UK Approved Therapists. All information is kept strictly confidential. Read our privacy policy here.

Your initial therapy referral form is retained by Anxiety UK for two years although once allocated to an Anxiety UK Approved therapist they may keep their records of your treatment for up to seven years. You can read our privacy policy here.

We will contact your GP/other relevant professionals involved in your care, prior to starting/during therapy, if you disclose information that results in needing approval for consent to begin/continue therapy, including, but not limited to, feelings of suicidality and/or self-harm, taking specific prescribed medication(s), existence of specific physical or mental health issues, are under/have been under recent care of a mental health crisis service/secondary care mental health team. In most cases, this would be discussed with you before contact is made, however, if issues of safety arise, this may not always be possible. Until consent is received by your GP/other relevant professionals involved in your care, therapy will not begin/will be put on hold.

No, the staff at Anxiety UK and our Anxiety UK Approved Therapists are not able to give pharmaceutical advice or prescribe medication. You should always consult your GP if you have any questions about your medication.

In line with current best practice, it is not advisable to pursue more than one therapy at a time. Different therapy approaches are based on different models and may use techniques that have opposing effects on underlying psychological mechanisms. In other words, you risk ‘diluting’ the positive effects of therapy. This also means that if someone gets better or worse, then it is hard to know which treatment was responsible. However, sometimes people do access one form of therapy, for example counselling, while waiting to start another such as CBT or EMDR.

We may from time to time use statistical and aggregated data derived from your personal data to enable Anxiety UK to share aggregated outcome data for the purpose of evaluation, promotion, marketing and research of Anxiety UK’s therapy services. Any aggregated data will be in anonymous form and will not identify you as an individual in any way. For full details of our Privacy policy visit here.

Anxiety UK will ensure your referral data will be treated confidentially at all times during your therapy support and we comply with current UK legislation to ensure your data is stored safely and protected.

Anxiety UK Approved Therapists are required by law to apply the same level of protection to your data, while also complying with the ethical framework of their respective professional body in relation to client confidentiality. Anxiety UK maintains regular liaison with Anxiety UK Approved Therapists to ensure compliance in this respect.

If you have requested that Anxiety UK correspond with you by e-mail, this will require e-mailing your personal data outside of our own IT network. We need to inform you there is the risk of data loss by e-mailing outside our IT network. Before we can proceed with your request, we will require written confirmation (this can be an e-mail response) that you do accept the risk of data loss.

If you choose to access therapy support via Skype, Zoom or Vsee or other online platforms, we cannot control data absolutely or guarantee total security.

Home visits are only available in exceptional circumstances and will always be subject to a therapist being available to undertake such a request in your area. All home visits will be charged at a minimum of Tier 2 costs and will also be subject to a surcharge which is paid direct to the Anxiety UK Approved Therapist for all sessions at the rate of 45p/mile for travel costs.

You can make a comment, compliment or complaint at any time during your experience of accessing therapy by emailing: [email protected]

As part of our quality assurance process, we will contact you whilst you are accessing our therapy services, to monitor the quality of the service you have received.

If you unhappy with the type of therapy you are accessing, please contact [email protected]. Depending on which therapy type you switch to, you may be required to pay an additional fee.

You must give as much notice as possible if you cannot attend a pre-arranged session by informing your Anxiety UK Approved Therapist directly. If you miss a pre-arranged session without giving 48 hours’ notice, you will be required to pay for this session in accordance with our missed appointments policy. If you arrive late for your therapy appointment, please respect that your Anxiety UK Approved Therapist will not be able to provide a full session.

Whenever your Anxiety UK Approved Therapist is unable to attend an appointment, they/we will endeavour to give as much notice as possible. For this reason, it is essential that your Anxiety UK Approved Therapist has your up to date contact telephone number. If for any unforeseen reason your Anxiety UK Approved Therapist does have to amend and/or cancel an appointment, they will contact you by telephone/your preferred method.

If we are informed that there has been a gap in your therapy of more than four weeks which has not been agreed in advance with your Anxiety UK Approved Therapist, your therapy support will be terminated (unless there are exceptional circumstances). If you wish to re-access therapy through Anxiety UK at a later stage,  we cannot guarantee that we will be able to place you back in the care of your original Anxiety UK Approved Therapist. The referral will be treated as a new ‘episode’ of care and as such the first, second and last sessions will be payable to Anxiety UK.

Up to 6 top-up sessions are available after you complete therapy.  To access top-up sessions, you must make a request within 6 months of completing therapy sessions with an Anxiety UK Approved Therapist. Top-up sessions are subject to Anxiety UK Approved Therapist availability and your membership with Anxiety UK remaining valid.

Additionally, please note: we advise, and strongly recommend, that clients do not embark on a new course of therapy after having accessed a course of therapy for at least 6 months.  This is to allow consolidation and processing of therapy content to occur.   Only in exceptional circumstances will Anxiety UK facilitate a referral to an Anxiety UK Approved Therapist outside of this timescale.

Anxiety UK does not offer refunds if:

• A face to face Anxiety UK Approved Therapist is not available (this is because we are usually able to refer clients for therapy via webcam or telephone)
• You change your mind about wanting therapy, either because you have obtained access to an NHS/private therapist, or for any other reason including failing to provide the relevant evidence of eligibility.
• Your financial circumstances change; we are unable to provide a refund for any difference in session fees. However, you will be entitled to lower ongoing session fees where appropriate and upon production of relevant supporting documentation.
• In exceptional circumstances where refunds in respect of therapy services purchased are offered, any refunds will be made minus a 15% admin fee. If a refund for therapy is provided, the member will not also have their membership fee refunded (as these are considered two separate services).

Our full terms and conditions can be read on our website here.

We provide therapy to people based all over the world (though there are some exceptions such as the Anxiety UK Therapy Benevolent Fund), additionally, some  Anxiety UK Approved Therapists are able to deliver therapy in languages other than English. If you have a specific language need and wish to ascertain if this can be accommodated, and/or are based outside of the UK and wish to determine if we are able to offer therapy support, please email: [email protected].

If you are experiencing significant financial hardship and need therapy to help with an anxiety disorder, Anxiety UK’s Therapy Benevolent Fund might be able to help.  Each year, this scheme provides funded access for a number of  individuals to receive a specified number of therapy sessions with an Anxiety UK Approved Therapist through the charity’s therapy services.  

To find out more about the Anxiety UK Therapy Benevolent Fund and to obtain an application form, email: [email protected] 

Please note we are currently not accepting new applications to the fund, this page will be updated as soon as the scheme reopens.

Please note:

• Priority will be given to Anxiety UK members.
• The fund is only available to UK residents.
• Only one application per individual per lifetime can be made to the Anxiety UK Therapy Benevolent Fund. 
• Anxiety UK reserves the right to close the Anxiety UK Therapy Benevolent Fund prematurely each year if demand exceeds resources available.
• Any decision made by Anxiety UK regarding applications to the Anxiety UK Therapy Benevolent Fund is final and upon submission of all relevant documentation requested by Anxiety UK. 
• The Anxiety UK Therapy Benevolent Fund is not a cash scheme and requests for monetary support will not be considered.
• The number of individuals supported and the number of therapy sessions supported through the Anxiety UK Therapy Benevolent Fund varies each year.

We recognise that choosing to seek support is a personal matter with therapy being a subjective process.  This may mean that occasionally clients may not ‘gel’ with their therapist and so may request to change therapist or alternatively, the type of talking therapy accessed.

Whenever possible we will always aim to accommodate such requests, however if after trying a different style of therapy or following the reallocation to a different therapist, subsequent further changes are requested, due to capacity issues (including being a small team), we reserve the right to decline such requests, due to having reached the limits of what our therapy service is able to offer.