Confidentiality
What does confidentiality mean?
Confidentiality means not telling anyone else what you’ve said. MEIC knows how important it is to be able to talk about what’s going on in your life knowing that what you say won’t be passed on to anyone else.
When you contact the MEIC Helpline by phone, text, email or webchat, what you tell us won’t be passed on to any other person or organisation outside of MEIC unless you want it to. Sometimes the helpline advisor you are talking with may need to discuss what you’ve said with a colleague to make sure we give you the best help we possibly can.
Is MEIC always confidential?
If you are under 18 we will only pass on information that you have told us, with or without your permission, if you or another child or young person is unsafe (we call this significant harm).
If you are over 18 we will pass on information you have shared with us if you tell us about a child or young person who is at risk of harm or if you, or another adult, is in a life threatening situation.
So we take action when we have information that other organisations could use to help protect you or someone else. Of course when this happens we will always keep in contact with you and explain what we are doing.
If you have any questions or worries about confidentiality, check it out with the Helpline Advisor at the beginning of your call, text, email or webchat.
What do I need to tell MEIC about myself?
Nothing if you don’t want to. We will usually ask for your age and where you live in Wales so we can find information that will be useful to you, but you are in control of what you tell us about yourself.
If you want us to get in touch with someone else for you or contact another organisation that could help you further with what’s going on in your life you may want to give us your name, address, contact details and possibly other information - but this is up to you.
Do you know my phone number/e-mail address?
No, we don’t know your phone number or email address unless you give them to us.
Will my call to MEIC be on the phone bill, and can I call free on my mobile?
Because MEIC is an 0808 number, calls are free and don't show up on a BT or cable phone bill. Calls to MEIC on 080880 23456 are currently free from all the existing networks - 3, BT Mobile, Fresh, O2, Orange, T Mobile, Virgin, Vodafone. We have been told that calls will not appear on any of these bills.
The telephone number will still appear in your list of dialled calls on your mobile as 080880 23456. If you don't want people to see the number in your list of dialled calls, you should delete this from your called number list.
Can anyone see that I’ve used my home computer to get in touch with MEIC?
No one will be able to read any messages you’ve sent to MEIC or received from a MEIC adviser as long as you keep your password private. It is possible for someone to see the history of the sites you have visited on your computer but not if you have deleted your history. If you want to delete this history see the “cover your tracks” section for advice about how to do this.
Who at MEIC knows about what I’ve talked about?
Sometimes a MEIC supervisor may listen into the phone call or read your text, instant message or email to make sure that the MEIC advisers are helping you in the best way they can.
We do not record your messages here at MEIC but we do record the number of calls, texts, instant messages and emails that we get. We also record what type of help we give out but we don’t keep any information on who had that help.
When you text the MEIC helpline we can see other texts that have been sent from that telephone number but we can not identify who you are or the number that you are texting from.
Other Questions?
You can get in touch with MEIC by phoning or texting on 080880 23456 or contacting us with a question by webchat or email.
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