What Legal And Professional Requirements Do I Have To Meet?

The specific legal and professional requirements you will need to meet will vary according to the type of therapy you practise. However, there are some requirements which will apply to any therapist regardless of the nature of their practice. You will need:

• to take out appropriate professional insurance
• to comply with the provisions of the Disability Discrimination Act
• to comply with the provisions of the Data Protection Act
• to comply with any other relevant legislation
• to comply with client confidentiality
• to comply with financial and taxation legal requirements
• to comply with the membership requirements of any professional bodies of which you are a member.

Insurance

Most professional bodies will not list your practice in their directory or on their website unless you can prove that you have taken out adequate insurance to cover any professional and legal liabilities you may incur. Your clients are unlikely to ask you whether you are insured, but it is always good practice to confirm your insurance status in your practice brochure and in any fliers or leaflets you may distribute.

Whether you require any other insurances will depend on the work you are engaged in and where and how you practise. Many professional organisations offer blanket insurance cover as part of their membership fee. And most training schools and institutions effect their own insurance for students whilst they are training, and can offer good deals for graduate students who want to insure with the same company. If you practise more than one therapy you do need to insure that each therapy is adequately covered – if in doubt talk it through with your insurers.

Professional Indemnity Insurance

This is a must for any practising therapist, as it covers you for any legal action taken against you as a result of your work or your products. It is unlikely to be an expensive undertaking unless your therapy work has a high risk attached to it. A number of insurers offer low-cost policies which take into account all your professional risks and for a moderate increase in premium will include any other therapies that you practise under the one blanket policy.

Depending on the nature of your work you may have one or more endorsements attached to your policy. These are rarely very limiting, and normally only relate to activities outside the usual bounds for your particular therapy. For example, a Qi Gong practitioner may have an endorsement on their insurance policy which means that they are not covered for giving injections as part of their therapeutic work. This would not affect most Qi Gong practitioners and instructors as their work is non-invasive. However, you do need to check carefully any endorsements that are made to your policy in case these do relate to you and the way in which you work.

You should be thinking in terms of £2 million cover at least. If you are thinking of doing corporate work or hiring rooms for workshops or seminars, you might want to increase your cover to £5 million.

Public Liability Insurance

This covers your liabilities at law in respect of anyone who enters your premises as part of your work. For example, if one of your clients has the misfortune to trip over the edge of your carpet, falls and breaks their wrist and can’t work, they may decide to sue you for their loss of earnings this is the kind of accident that this insurance covers. You may think the likelihood of this happening is remote, hut you should insure for this just the same. If you work in rooms in a shared or managed building, the landlord’s public liability insurance will cover any accidents occurring in the common parts of the building such as the toilets or on the stairs, but you will need your own cover for your rooms or workspace.