Fees and Hours

Fees

Fees are payable directly to the psychotherapist by cheque, cash or electronic transfer/online. We are unable to accept credit cards or debit cards.

Fees are negotiated with each therapist. On average, you can expect to pay around £70 per 50-minute session.  Fees may be different depending on the time of day (evening sessions are more expensive, for instance), whether you are attending as an individual or couple, and various other factors, including the income level of the client.

Initial, informal assessment appointments are sometimes at half-fee, depending on the therapist. Short meetings to discuss therapy are usually free.

A formal assessment appointment will be charged at the standard fee. Please check before you come.

Although some Bridge therapists are registered providers with a range of medical insurance companies, for the most part we no longer provide service via insurance. Over the past five years, we have found medical insurers increasingly reluctant to fund psychological treatments, imposing rather narrow and unrealistic strictures around registration requirements, length of treatment, etc.

For these reasons, even when we do agree to insurance funding, we will no longer bill the insurer directly.  You will need to pay us and then recover funding from your insurer. So we advise that you make thorough enquiries of both your insurance provider and your therapist before proceeding.

This applies to other sorts of ‘third-party payments’ as well (ie your therapy being funded by an employer or relative).  You pay us; they pay you.  We find this keeps things ‘clean’.  It prevents your therapy being compromised or interrupted by a company or individual suddenly refusing or neglecting to pay for service already provided.

 

Hours

We see people between noon and 10:00 pm every day, except Friday, Saturday and Sunday.  Because we work late into the evening, we do not offer morning appointments.

All sessions are fifty minutes long.  The ten minutes at the end of each hour allow your therapist to make some notes of your session (while fresh in the mind) and prepare for the next client.

We see people on the hour.  Unfortunately, we cannot schedule off-hour appointments.

Everyone occasionally has to make a change

If you’re ill, please let us know.  We see a number of chronically ill clients, and people with compromised immune systems.   So as much as possible, we need to try and avoid passing viruses around.  Not everyone shakes a cold easily, and for some clients, a virus can leave them ill for months.  If you’ve come down with something, let us know so that we can reschedule your appointment.

If pressure of work, travel or a social engagement require that you change your appointment, we’ll try to be as flexible and accommodating as possible.  We do ask that you give us a minimum of 2 working days notice…so that someone else can take advantage of the session.  Changes without 2 days notice may incur a full fee charge.