policies

• Nightline is a confidential and anonymous service. In order to protect our callers and uphold the confidentiality principle, none of our volunteers are allowed to give any information discussed during calls to individuals outside of Nightline. In order to comply with legal standards, there are three exceptions to this. In any case the coordinator team shall be notified immediately. 
• 1.1 The first exception is any information about terrorism, defined as an intention or threat to act upon harming any members of our society for political, religious, racial or ideological cause, which will need to be immediately reported to both the police and the coordinator team in as much detail as possible.
• 1.2 The second exception is by court order, where the police come to Nightline with a court mandate for information. The coordinators will handle this and will proactively contact any individual volunteer who may have more detailed information.
• 1.3 The third exception are calls presenting harm, abuse or neglect of a child as outlined in policy 13: Safeguarding Children. This states that if a caller reveals that they are 16 or younger, or it is obvious that a caller is 16 or under from the information they have shared, the volunteer should signpost them to Childline as a service set up to support children and inform the caller that the volunteer may need to report any information they disclose that identifies a child at risk of harm.
• 1.4 The fourth and final exception is in the event of a suicidal caller who appears to have the intention of ending their life, or has already taken steps to do so. In this event the Nightline volunteer can offer to call the emergency services on their behalf if this is accepted or if later in the call this is requested by the caller in such a manner as outlined in the Suicidal Caller Policy. 
• Different personalities or individuals within the same call are to be regarded as a new caller and no information should be given of the conversation with the previous person.
  
• Calls may be discussed within Nightline for training and support purposes only. These calls must be made anonymous through the leaving out of identifying details by the volunteer(s) who took and/or is discussing the call.
  
  1. Volunteers who have a question about training and want to bring up a specific call shall do so with the training coordinator.
     
  2. Volunteers who have a question about the constitution or the policies shall do so with any coordinator, or bring it as a point to the executive committee.
     
     
  3. Volunteers who require support with a specific call they’ve had, can do so with the designated social and support officers, or any other member of nightline they feel comfortable with and has the will to help.
     
• Callers abusing the service (explained in policy document 1: Call taking, section 6) are in breach of our terms of service. Nonetheless, the confidentiality policies outlined above shall apply, with two exceptions.
  
  1. In extreme cases (serious and realistic threat of harm to any/all volunteers of nightline or damage to its property) as much detail of the caller as possible may be handed to the police by the coordinators. The executive committee shall make a decision on whether or not to do so on a case by case basis.
  2. Any information regarding a child at risk of harm, even if the call is regarded as an abuse of the service, that suggests a child may be at risk of harm should be reported to the NSPCC and/or the police at 999 as soon as possible. This is not something that we are obliged to tell the caller.
• Volunteers are required to declare if another volunteer is in the room with them. No calls will be monitored or listened to. No volunteer of nightline will ever record any calls (phone, email or IM).
  
• In the event a phone number could be made visible to volunteers, efforts shall be made to anonymise this.
  
  1. If a number does appear to any volunteer, they are to ignore it completely and only make the executive committee aware that this has happened and how.
     
• For confidentiality purposes, all Instant Messaging records shall be deleted at the end of each shift. All Email records that are older than 7 days shall be deleted before 28 days at the beginning of each shift. 
• After every call, a call log shall be filled in on the nightline portal with appropriate information on times, dates and generalised topics. Any identifying features of the caller must not be disclosed, only enough information so that other volunteers understand the call content.
• Every volunteer at Aberystwyth Nightline will be required to sign a copy of the confidentiality agreement, in which they state to be aware of and adhere to our confidentiality policy.
  
• Any volunteer who breaches the confidentiality policy will be subject to disciplinary policy and could be in breach of law.
• As a part of the association’s Good Practice Guidelines (GPG) an effort will be made to ensure that The Confidentiality Policy is made into public knowledge
  1. Aberystwyth Nightline interprets this by ensuring our Confidentiality Policy is available both on our website