LEGAL 

Terms of Engagement

The Vital Balance Terms of Engagement

Updated: 16 May 2024

This contract outlines the framework for services at The Vital Balance with Livia Lai, Nutritional Therapist, including what you can expect from your Nutritional Therapist, and what responsibilities you have as a client.

In this contract:

    ‘I’, ‘me’ or ‘my’ means Livia Lai, Nutritional Therapist at The Vital Balance

and

   ‘Client’, ‘you’ or ‘your’ means the person buying or using my services and resources.

Please read the following important terms of engagement before you commit to using services at The Vital Balance. At this time, you are required to sign the bottom of the page to agree to our terms and conditions.

If you would like to speak to me about any aspect of this contract, please contact me by e-mail at: livia@thevitalbalance.co.uk.

Scope of Practice

Nutritional Therapy is the application of nutrition science in the promotion of health, peak performance, and individual care.  Nutritional therapy practitioners use a wide range of tools to assess and identify potential nutritional imbalances and understand how these may contribute to an individual’s symptoms and health concerns.  This approach allows them to work with individuals to address nutritional balance and help support the body towards maintaining health.  Nutritional therapy is recognised as a complementary medicine and is relevant for individuals with chronic conditions, as well as those looking for support to enhance their health and wellbeing.

Practitioners consider each individual to be unique and recommend personalised nutrition and lifestyle programmes rather than a ‘one size fits all’ approach.  Practitioners never recommend nutritional therapy as a replacement for medical advice and always refer any client with ‘red flag’ signs or symptoms to their medical professional.  They will also frequently work alongside a medical professional and will communicate with other healthcare professionals involved in the client’s care to explain any nutritional therapy programme that has been provided.

We request that our clients note the following:

·       The degree of benefit obtainable from Nutritional Therapy may vary between clients with similar health problems and following a similar Nutritional Therapy programme.

·       Nutritional advice will be tailored to support health conditions and/or health concerns identified and agreed between both parties.

·       Nutritional therapists are not permitted to diagnose, or claim to treat, medical conditions.

·       Nutritional advice is not a substitute for professional medical advice and/or treatment.

·       Your nutritional therapist may recommend food supplements and/or functional testing as part of your Nutritional Therapy programme and may receive a commission on these products or services.

 

The Client understands and agrees with the following:

·       You are responsible for contacting your doctor or doctors about any health concerns you may have.

·       You need to give your nutritional therapist permission to contact your GP regarding any agreed aspects of your case.

·       Please advise your doctor of the nutritional plan you will be following. Please also advise any other complementary medicine practitioners you are consulting.

·       It is important that you tell your nutritional therapist about any medical diagnosis you have received any prescription medication, herbal medicine or food supplements or over the counter medication you are taking as it may affect the nutritional programme.

·       If you are unclear about any part of your plan, then you should contact your nutritional therapist immediately for clarification.

·       Your nutritional programme and supplement plan will have a time frame and you should not continue with recommendations outside of this unless agreed by your nutritional therapist. This is to avoid any adverse reactions.

·       Recording consultations using any form of electronic media is not allowed without the written permission of both you and your nutritional therapist.

 

IMPORTANT: Legal Disclaimers about results

The nutritional therapist is to support and coach you in reaching your own goals, but your success depends primarily on your own effort, motivation, compliance, commitment and follow-through. The Vital Balance does not guarantee that you will attain a particular result, and you accept and understand that results differ for everyone. Everyone’s results depend on his or her dedication, desire, motivation and actions. Your results will be based on many different variables, many of which are out of my control, and therefore I do not make any guarantees as to your outcome. You fully agree that there are no guarantees as to the specific outcomes or results you can expect from using the information you receive on or through this website.

 

Consultations

You will discuss and agree what support you want from your nutritional therapist in your first session and review the progress and focus of your work together as you progress along the programme. The initial consultation will take up to 90 minutes. The monthly follow up sessions will take up to 45 minutes and check-in sessions will take up 20 minutes.

Consultations will be conducted online via a video call using either Zoom, Microsoft Teams or Google Meet. It is your responsibility to have a working internet connection for all Zoom, MS Teams and Google Meet sessions.

 

Programme Timeframe

The 3-month programme must be completed within 5 months, upon booking.

The programme start date is the date of the booked initial consultation. This means if you have booked in the initial consultation on the 1st of Jan then the 3-month programme will end on the 31st of March.

 

Payments

To work with Livia Lai at The Vital Balance, you need to have made the full payment or first payment instalment PRIOR to booking your initial consultation with me.

Payments can be made by card via the online payment system. A debit or credit card number will be requested at the time of booking when booking online.

If you had chosen to pay your service to Livia Lai with a payment plan, you need to understand that a payment plan is not a subscription that you can cancel at any time (like you would do with Netflix as an example).

A payment plan is a legal commitment to conclude your payment in total.

This means that if you had agreed to pay 3 payments of £335 you must pay them in full.

Failure to do so will result in being signalled to the competent authorities. This will have an impact on your credit score and may lead to legal action as well.

 

Cancellations & No Shows

Cancelling your programme up to 48 hours after your full payment or first instalment payment will trigger a full refund, excluding the processing fees charged by Stripe. Should you choose to cancel your programme, for any reason, at any point after 48 hours of payment, no refunds will be given.

I appreciate that circumstances can change. If you need to rearrange an appointment, at least 48 hours’ notice is required. You can do this by emailing: livia@thevitalbalance.co.uk

It is your responsibility to have a working internet connection for consultations via Video call. A 15-minute wait time frame will be applied to all sessions. Once 15 minutes of your appointment has elapsed, and you haven't arrived at your session, the session will be ended and will be classed a 'no-show'. If you no show for your appointment, you will forfeit the scheduled session.

Confidentiality

The confidentiality of our clients is treated seriously at The Vital Balance.  There are, however, some limits and exceptions to confidentiality.

If your Nutritional Therapist has serious concerns about your safety or the safety of another person, our confidentiality policy may be adjusted. At your initial consultation you will be asked to provide your GP’s contact details, as someone we may contact. The Vital Balance keeps a record of your name, contact details and dates and times of appointments. Your Nutritional Therapist is required to keep brief notes about the focus of your work, which are kept securely. Any reports

produced by The Vital Balance to evaluate the service contain anonymised data and will not contain any identifying information of clients.

Please refer to our Privacy Policy on our website for more details Information about you disclosed during our sessions or in the pre-consultation forms will be kept confidential.

Anonymised Feedback

The Vital Balance will at times be sharing anonymised client feedback on our social media and websites. Personal identifiable information such as full name, username and photo and such will be hidden. Please inform via writing by emailing livia@thevitalbalance.co.uk should you wish to not have your anonymised feedback shared on our social media and websites.

Working with Multiple Practitioners

I may suggest you see other registered therapists to support your goals. Information about your symptoms and condition will be discussed between me and other therapists so that we can provide you with a co-ordinated therapy plan. I will ask for your informed consent to share information with the other registered therapists and ask if there is anything that you want to remain confidential. I will help you assimilate any information gathered from other registered therapists.

 

Resolving Problems

In the unlikely event that there is a problem with the services, please contact me as soon as possible and give me a reasonable opportunity to sort out any problems with you and reach a positive outcome.

 

Privacy Policy

For information on how your data is processed and stored, please read the Privacy Policy on my website.

Privacy Policy

The Vital Balance holds some information about you. This page outlines how that information is used, who we may share that information with and how we keep it secure. This notice does not provide exhaustive detail – we are happy to provide any additional information or explanation needed. Any requests for this should be sent to livia@thevitalbalance.co.uk

We keep our Privacy Notice under regular review. This Privacy Notice was last reviewed in August 2023.

WHY DO WE NEED TO KEEP PERSONAL INFORMATION?

Individuals attend the consultation to obtain help, guidance and advice on health and lifestyle. Obtaining personal information from the clientin respect of their contact details, their personal and family health histories, and their lifestyle choices are necessary in order to provide the advice and guidance requested. Financial information is necessary in order to process payments for the services provided. All personal information is processed lawfully, fairly and in a transparent manner. Personal data is held by The Vital Balance iswith the express consent of the client. Our lawful basis for processing personal information is legitimate interests. Information is collected: via a questionnaire completed by the client; during a personal consultation; through email; via a website; over the telephone or by post; by taking card and online payments. The Vital Balance is a data processor and controller for the personal data it processes. No decisions are made by automated means.

WHAT INFORMATION IS HELD?

The personal information held contains the following information: Contact details: name, address, date of birth, landline telephone number, mobile telephone number, email address and preferred method of contact.

Health Information: personal and family health history, lifestyle and social circumstances, physical and mental health details, GP contact details.

Financial details: invoices for goods and services provided, payments made and any outstanding debt. Merchant copies of credit card receipts are kept for accounting records. Other information: Referrals and appointment records.

Diagnostic information: Diagnosis of the condition and recommended treatments will be recorded. Test results.

WHAT FORM DOES THE INFORMATION HAVE AND IS IT SECURE?

Personal data is held by The Vital Balance in a variety of forms:

1. The nutritional therapist may make notes using a laptop with the data being stored in the cloud.

2. Online: personal information is held on digital software programmes for diary/calendar, invoicing and accountancy processing. When you become a client and sign up to Healthpath please refer to the Healthpath website for the Privacy Policy.

3. Information may be held in email format, provided by the client and held within the online emailing system.

All online and cloud storage of data is encrypted and protected by logins and passwords. All of our external data processors that support us (such as Paypal and our booking and financial software providers) are legally and contractually bound to operate and prove security arrangements are in place to protect personal information.

HOW LONG IS INFORMATION KEPT?

Your information will be kept for 7 years from the date of your appointment, unless you are under 18 in which case it will be kept for 7 years from the date you reach 18.

WHO DO WE SHARE DATA WITH?

Personal contact information and financial information provided by the client is available to the nutritional therapist. The nutritional therapist view health and other information necessary for the consultation and they must follow the common law duty of confidence: Where information is given by the client in confidence it is treated as confidential and protected accordingly. Individual express consent will be obtained to share information with the client’s GP. None of the information is shared with other organisations except:

• Contact details will be provided to suppliers of products that the client wishes us to order on their behalf.

• Contact details will be provided to organisations that provide health testing facilities such as blood testing.

In all cases the client provides permission to do so. Anonymous information concerning particular health issues and case histories may be shared with peers for the purpose of professional development. This may be at clinical supervision meetings or at conferences. Personal data may be shared where there is an overriding public interest in doing so, for instance, to safeguard an individual, or to prevent a serious crime. We do not share any information for marketing purposes.

WHAT ARE YOUR RIGHTS?

Under data protection law, you have the right to ask us for copies of your personal information. You have the right to ask us to rectify personal information you think is inaccurate. You also have the right to ask us to complete information you think is incomplete. You have the right to ask us to erase your personal information in certain circumstances. However, that may result in the business relationship being unable to continue as the information in its current form is necessary for the desired outcome. You have the right to ask us to erase your personal information in certain circumstances. You have the right to ask us to restrict the processing of your personal information in certain circumstances. You have the the right to object to the processing of your personal information in certain circumstances. You have the right to ask that we transfer the personal information you gave us to another organisation, or to you, in certain circumstances.

You are not required to pay any charge for exercising your rights. Requests for access must be in writing, by email. If you make a request, we have one month to respond to you. Access can be given to examine the records free of charge. If you would like to invoke any of your rights please email at livia@thevitalbalance.co.uk.

COMPLAINTS

If you have any concerns about our use of your personal information, you can make a complaint to us at livia@thevitalbalance.co.uk. If a complaint is not resolved satisfactorily a more formal complaint can be made to the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) on or 0303 123 1113.

Full Disclaimer

Last Updated September 23, 2023

Pease read this disclaimer prior to using the www.thevitalbalance.com website (here after referred to as “website”). 

This website is owned and operated by The Vital Balance.

By viewing this website or anything made available on it or through this website, including but not limited to blog posts, consultations, emails, programs, products, courses, services, e-books, videos, webinars, e-newsletters, social media and/or other communication (collectively referred to as “Website”), you voluntarily agree to this disclaimer. You agree that you have read (or had the opportunity to read but have chosen not to read), understand, and consent to this disclaimer. Thus, if you do not agree to the Disclaimer below, STOP now, and do not access or use this Website, or any of my Programs, Products or Services.

Important Notice: For educational and informational purposes only. This information is not for medical or mental health advice. 

The purpose of the Site is to provide information & education on nutrition, healthy lifestyle, supplementation, healthy cooking and solely to be used as a self help tool for your own use.

Not Medical or Mental Health Advice

I am not, nor am I holding myself out to be a doctor/physician, nurse or any other medical professional (“Medical Provider”), psychiatrist, psychologist, therapist, counselor, or social worker (“Mental Health Provider”). 

All readers and viewers of this content are advised to consult their doctors or qualified health professionals regarding specific health questions. Always seek the advice of your own Medical Provider and/or Mental Health Provider regarding any questions or concerns you have about your specific health or any medications, herbs or supplements you are currently taking and before implementing any recommendations or suggestions from our Website. Do not disregard medical advice or delay seeking medical advice because of information you have read on this Website. Do not start or stop taking any medications without speaking to your own Medical Provider or Mental Health Provider. If you have or suspect that you have a medical or mental health problem, contact your own Medical Provider or Mental Health Provider promptly. 

Livia Lai, Nutritional Therapist/The Vital Balance does not take responsibility for possible health consequences of any person or persons reading or following the information in this educational content. None of the opinions, recommendations, or information contained on this site have been independently evaluated by the Food and Drug Administration. No information on this site should be used to diagnose, treat, prevent or cure any disease or condition under any circumstances.

Personal Responsibility

You aim to accurately represent the information provided to us on or through our Website, Programs, Products and Services. You acknowledge that you are participating voluntarily in using my Website, Programs, Products and Services, and you alone are solely and personally responsible for your choices, actions and results. You agree to use your own due diligence and judgment before applying any recommendation or suggestion that you may receive on or through our Website, Programs, Products and/or Services. You acknowledge that you take full responsibility for your health, life and well-being, as well as the health, lives and well-being of your family and children (where applicable), for all decisions now and in the future.

No Guarantees

My role as a Nutritional Therapist is to support and coach you in reaching your own goals, but your success depends primarily on your own effort, motivation, commitment and follow-through. I do not guarantee that you will attain a particular result, and you accept and understand that results differ for each individual. Each individual’s results depend on his or her dedication, desire, motivation and actions. Your results will be based on many different variables, many of which are out of my control, and therefore I do not make any guarantees as to your outcome. You fully agree that there are no guarantees as to the specific outcomes or results you can expect from using the information you receive on or through this website.

Assumption of Risk

As with all situations, there are sometimes unknown individual risks and circumstances that can arise during use of my Website that cannot be foreseen that can influence or reduce results. You understand that any mention of any suggestion or recommendation on or through my Website is to be taken at your own risk, with no liability on my part, recognizing that there is a rare chance that illness, injury or even death could result, and you agree to assume all risks.  

Limitation of Liability

By using this Website, you agree to absolve me of any liability or loss that you or any other person may incur from use of the information, products or materials that you request or receive through or on my Website. You agree that I will not be liable to you, or to any other individual, company or entity, for any type of damages, including direct, indirect, special, incidental, equitable or consequential loss or damages, for use of or reliance on my Website. You agree that I do not assume liability for accidents, delays, injuries, harm, loss, damage, death, lost profits, personal or business interruptions, misapplication of information, physical or mental disease or condition or issue, or any other type of loss or damage due to any act or default by me or anyone acting as our agent, consultant, affiliate, joint venture partner, employee, shareholder, director, staff, team member, or anyone otherwise affiliated with my business or me, who is engaged in delivering content on or through this Website.

Indemnification and Release of Claims

You hereby fully and completely hold harmless, indemnify and release me and any of my agents, consultants, affiliates, joint venture partners, employees, shareholders, directors, staff, team members, or anyone otherwise affiliated with my business or me from any and all causes of action, allegations, suits, claims, damages, or demands whatsoever, in law or equity, that may arise in the past, present or future that is in any way related to my Website. 

No Warranties

I MAKE NO WARRANTIES RELATED TO THE PERFORMANCE OR OPERATION OF MY WEBSITE.  I MAKE NO REPRESENTATIONS OR WARRANTIES OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, AS TO THE INFORMATION, CONTENT, MATERIALS, PROGRAMS, PRODUCTS OR SERVICES INCLUDED ON OR THROUGH THE WEBSITE. TO THE FULL EXTENT PERMISSIBLE BY APPLICABLE LAW, I DISCLAIM ALL WARRANTIES, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY AND FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. 

Errors and Omissions

Although every effort is made to ensure the accuracy of information shared on or through this Website, the information may inadvertently contain inaccuracies or typographical errors. You agree that I am not responsible for the views, opinions, or accuracy of facts referenced on or through my Website, or of those of any other individual or company affiliated with my business or me in any way. Because scientific, technology and business practices are constantly evolving, you agree that I am not responsible for the accuracy of my Website, or for any errors or omissions that may occur.

No Endorsement

References or links in my Website to the information, opinions, advice, programs, products or services of any other individual, business or entity does not constitute my formal endorsement. I am merely sharing information for your own self-help only. I am not responsible for the website content, blogs, e-mails, videos, social media, programs, products and/or services of any other person, business or entity that may be linked or referenced in my Website. Conversely, should my Website link appear in any other individual’s, business’s or entity’s website, program, product or services, it does not constitute my formal endorsement of them, their business or their website either.

Affiliates

From time to time, I may promote, affiliate with, or partner with other individuals or businesses whose programs, products and services align with mine and my program.  In the spirit of transparency, I want you to be aware that there may be instances when I promote, market, share or sell programs, products or services for other partners and in exchange I may receive financial compensation, a percentage profit, or other rewards. These profits assist in the sustaining of our small business. I am highly selective and I only promote the partners whose programs, products and/or services I respect. At the same time, you agree that any such promotion or marketing does not serve as any form of endorsement whatsoever. You are still required to use your own judgment to determine that any such program, product or service is appropriate for you. You are assuming all risks, and you agree that I am not liable in any way for any program, product or service that I may promote, market, share or sell on or through my Website.

We may feature sponsored blog posts. If we do, we will clearly state that the post is sponsored and by whom in the post. While we are committed to only featuring sponsored content from companies or products we have tried and loved, we make no warranties, guarantees, or representations as to the effectiveness or safety of said products or services. You should use them at your own risk and make all the appropriate investigations you need to on your own to feel comfortable using them. Please feel free to email us at livia@thevitalbalance.co.uk if you have any questions about our sponsored posts.

Testimonials/Examples

The Testimonials or examples on the Site are simply that: examples. While they are all accurate and authentic, we are not making any claims that you will experience the same or better results from using or purchasing the Site, Courses, Services, and/or any other Products from The Vital Balance.

Contact Me

By using my Website you are agreeing to all parts of the above Disclaimer. If you have any questions about this Disclaimer, please contact me at livia@thevitalbalance.co.uk.